The Watch in the Storm Drain: How She Outsmarted Her Kidnapper

True Kidnapping Stories · Jul 25, 2026 · 17m

The Watch in the Storm Drain: How She Outsmarted Her Kidnapper

Danger hid in plain sight: a pale blue wristwatch with a cracked crystal washed through a storm drain and surfaced on a grate with the message "GORDON HAS ME" written inside the band-found by a 14-year-old paperboy at 6:40 AM. The watch belonged to 67-year-old Rebecca Hughes, missing three days, and the only lead pointed to a man who had been watching her routine; how did a single watch become the clue that broke the case?

In this episode, we tell the sequence of events from the morning the watch was discovered to the…