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Tracer Rounds Welcomes Lauren Burns · Military Broadcast Radio | MBR Talk

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Welcome back to the Tracer Rounds podcast.
2:45
And I'm your host, Terry. And with me tonight is Lauren
2:49
Burns. And she has got such an
2:51
interesting story to tell us. It's one of it's kind of heart
2:54
wrenching and it'll kind of touch your heart and it'll, I
2:58
think the outcomes will give you joy too.
3:01
But in the meantime, she's going to explain how she's connected
3:05
to the military. She doesn't have military folks,
3:09
but her story includes some veterans and what they've done
3:13
for her and her family. So we're excited to welcome you
3:16
to the podcast today, Lauren. Well, thank you, Terry.
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I'm super excited to share. And I have to say before we get
3:24
started, thank you to the men and women that serve and risk
3:29
your life for our country and that have done that in the past
3:32
if you happen to be a veteran. Because if it wasn't for
3:37
veterans, I get emotional and I share.
3:41
I might not be sitting here because they risked their life
3:45
and they didn't have to to save mine.
3:48
So it's an honor to be on your show today, and it's an honor to
3:51
be able to share with your audience.
3:53
Thank you so much. I heard your story on OM the
3:58
Oscar Mike podcast with our, our one of our hosts, Travis, and I
4:03
was really touched and moved by your story.
4:05
And so I think if do you want to just kind of set the tone for
4:11
your childhood and growing up and then kind of what led to
4:16
your engagement with veterans and and with Miranda Lambert's
4:21
parents for that matter? Yes, yes, yes, yes.
4:25
There's a lot of twists and turns in my story.
4:27
And I, so Terry, I started my own podcast about a year ago
4:32
because I really felt like God was calling me to share my
4:36
story. It was almost one of those
4:37
moments of Lauren, how dare you let this story sit in a box in
4:42
your closet, literally, and not share what I did in your life
4:46
and what these men did in your life.
4:48
And so I prayed about it and I stepped out and started sharing.
4:52
So about a year ago I started sharing my my testimony, my
4:56
story publicly. When I was a child, I had a very
5:01
traumatic childhood. It was such a crazy story that
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NBC made a movie about my childhood called Desperate
5:09
Rescue, The Kathy Mahone story. Many people have heard my story.
5:13
It played on Lifetime over and over again because my father
5:19
kidnapped me and he took me to Jordan when I was seven years
5:22
old. And that's how my childhood
5:25
began. And so I'll back up a little bit
5:28
and give us some background. My parents met in the Dallas
5:31
area. My mom was from Florida and she
5:34
was working at like a Denny's. And my father is from Jordan and
5:38
he had moved to Dallas to go to school and start a career.
5:42
And they fell in love and soon about four years after their
5:47
marriage, they had me. My mom was pregnant, and during
5:51
the time of my mom being pregnant, my father told my mom
5:56
that he needed to go to Jordan to go take care of his father
5:59
because his father was sick. And my mom didn't think anything
6:02
of it. She was like, sure, of course,
6:05
go take care of your dad. And instead of being gone for a
6:09
few weeks, Terry, he was gone for three months.
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So in that time, he did not contact her.
6:17
He did not tell her what was going on.
6:19
So she was there in Dallas by herself thinking she was about
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to have a baby all by herself and not knowing what to do.
6:27
And her closest friends that you alluded to was Beverly and Rick
6:31
Lambert, way before Miranda Lambert became this huge country
6:34
singer-songwriter. She wasn't even a thought in in
6:37
their parents eyes at that point.
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That was my mom's closest friends.
6:42
And so she really leaned on them during this time.
6:45
But my dad came back to Dallas and told my mom that he had gone
6:51
to Jordan to make a home for us. And Terry, my dad, looked
6:55
different. He was wearing like a
6:57
traditional Jordanian clothing. He started going to the mosque,
7:01
and he was praying on his prayer rug.
7:04
My mom really didn't even recognize him at that time.
7:07
And so she freaked out. And she was like, we never
7:11
discussed moving. I don't want to leave the United
7:14
States. I don't want to go to Jordan.
7:16
So by the time I was six weeks old, she was filing for divorce.
7:22
So that's how my life started. I was, you know, in a broken
7:26
home, going between two households every other weekend,
7:29
going to my dad's house and going to the mosque and then
7:33
being with my mom and going to church.
7:36
But that's all I knew. And my father was great.
7:39
We had a great relationship. I, I call him the Disney dad.
7:43
You know, every other weekend we'd go to the movies and we'd
7:45
go to this little amusement park in the Dallas area.
7:48
And we had a really good relationship.
7:53
But all of that changed when I turned 7.
7:58
My father had remarried and had two other children.
8:01
I had a little brother and sister, and my dad asked my mom
8:06
if I could stay one extra night to go trick or treating.
8:08
This was Halloween weekend 1987. And my mom said sure of course
8:14
because they had a great relationship.
8:15
Anytime she needed help or he needed help, they just worked it
8:18
out. And she just said, make sure you
8:21
get Lauren to school on Monday because I was starting a new
8:24
school. He told her, yeah, no problem,
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she'll be there. So he came to pick me up.
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And Terry, when I started sharing my story, I mentioned
8:33
that box in my closet. I have all the photos.
8:37
I have the newspaper articles, the magazines, the movie.
8:40
I even have cassette tape recordings of phone
8:43
conversations between my mom and the State Department and calling
8:48
Jordan. I have everything to be able to
8:52
retell my story. But in that box, I found a
8:55
picture of me. I was dressed up like a
8:58
cheerleader. I had a blue and yellow
9:00
cheerleading outfit, pigtails, red lipstick.
9:03
My dad came to pick me up and I was super excited to go trick or
9:07
treating. And I get in the car and it was
9:10
just my dad and I my stepmom wasn't with him.
9:13
My siblings were not with him. And he turns around and looks at
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me in the back seat. And he said, I have a surprise
9:18
for you. And I'm like, yeah, we're going
9:21
to go trick or treating. He goes, well, actually, no, I'm
9:24
taking you to the airport because we're going to Jordan so
9:27
you can meet your family for the first time.
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Well, Terry, you know, why would I not trust my dad?
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So I start asking, does my mom know?
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She didn't tell me that we were going to do this.
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She said we were going for the treating.
9:42
Where's my brother? Where's my sister?
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And and my dad's driving to the airport.
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And the more questions I keep asking him, he starts to become
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frustrated and angry. And he's like, Lauren, it's
9:53
fine. Your mom knows.
9:54
She didn't want to ruin the surprise.
9:56
Don't worry, everything will be fine.
9:58
We'll see. And so we get on the plane and
10:03
we go to Jordan. And when we get there, things
10:07
were very, very different. Culture shock.
10:09
I had never been, I think, you know, I've been to Florida,
10:12
never been to Jordan. And I was meeting my my aunts
10:17
and my grandmother and they were very kind and loving.
10:19
Everyone spoke Arabic. I did not speak the language.
10:23
I wasn't accustomed to their culture, to the food, to the way
10:29
we did things and how different my father was.
10:35
All of a sudden, my dad, instead of being this father that would
10:38
tuck me in at night and get me ready for bed and read me
10:41
bedtime stories, it was like he was very distant.
10:45
It wasn't his job to take care of me.
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And I think that's some of the cultural differences.
10:50
It was the, it was the women's job to take care of me.
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And again, I didn't know them. And so I didn't have my mom, I
10:58
didn't have my stepmother, I didn't have anybody.
11:02
And every time I try to just ask, when can I talk to my mom?
11:04
Can I call her on the phone? When she when is she going to
11:07
come visit? He just kept pushing me off and
11:09
just kept saying, don't worry, you'll see.
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Don't you like it here? Don't you love spending time
11:14
with me, you know, and just sort of pushing everything off?
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So meanwhile, while that's going on, my mom goes to the school
11:24
that Monday and she was a single mom.
11:29
So for her to stop the middle of her day to go have lunch with a
11:33
kid was not her normal. You know, if your parent, you
11:38
know how hard that is if you did have one for the kid.
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And to me, that's one of those God moments is on this day she
11:46
did. So she goes to my school and she
11:49
gets there right at lunch as well.
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All the kids are lining up to go to the lunch room and she's
11:55
looking for me and she doesn't see me.
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And then the teacher catches her attention.
12:00
And so she goes over to the teacher and the teacher's like,
12:03
well, Kathy, Lauren never came to school today.
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Well, of course, my mom's mad because the last thing she said
12:08
to my dad is make sure Lauren gets to school.
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So she's mad. So this is in the 80s.
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There's no cell phone, so she goes to a pay phone, picks up
12:18
the pay phone, calls my daddy's house and nobody answers, Calls
12:23
the restaurant where he worked. And they told her that my dad
12:26
never showed up to work. That's when that anger turned to
12:31
fear. And it's almost like right
12:35
there, standing at that payphone, God was already sort
12:37
of talking to my mom. My mom had gone to Jordan before
12:41
they got married, so she knew that the main airlines into
12:44
Amman, Jordan was the Royal Alia Airlines, and the headquarters
12:47
is in New York City. So she called the headquarters
12:53
and standing at that pay phone when the woman answered, she
12:55
asked, do you have a Lauren and Ollie on your flight
12:58
reservation? And the woman told my mom, I'm
13:01
sorry, I can't give out that kind of information.
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Well, then my mom's voice changed and she said, please, I
13:07
think my ex husband's taken my daughter.
13:10
Can you please help me? She came back on the line and
13:14
she said yes, I have a Lauren and Ollie arriving in Amman this
13:19
evening so that was the moment she knew that my father had
13:23
taken me. I can't imagine.
13:27
She must have just been so scared and so worried.
13:30
I I can't imagine being, being the mom and knowing that your
13:34
child is somewhere where you have no idea you know when and
13:38
you've been gone. She doesn't know how long at
13:40
this point. She just knows you're not at
13:42
home and you're not in the US, so she doesn't really.
13:45
Yeah. Yeah, it, it had to have been at
13:48
least two days because he took me on a Friday and then this was
13:51
a Monday. And so she, her next phone call
13:55
was to Rick Lambert. He had a a pager.
13:58
He was a police officer for Dallas County, but he had
14:02
actually retired and him and his wife started a private
14:05
investigation company called Lambert and Lambert.
14:08
So she paged Rick and I actually, I interviewed Rick and
14:12
Beverly on my podcast and they retell this moment of this day.
14:17
Rick and Bev were actually working together at the Dallas
14:20
County Courthouse when the page came through and Rick went over
14:24
to the clerk and asked to borrow the phone and called my mom
14:28
back. And standing at that payphone,
14:30
my mom begins to tell Rick, Rick, Ollie has taken Lauren and
14:34
I don't know what to do. And he heard the panic in her
14:37
voice and he grabbed Beverly and Beverly could tell something was
14:41
wrong. And they they jumped in their
14:43
car and they drove to Richardson at my mom's townhouse where we
14:46
were living at the time. And Terry, that's where
14:49
everything started to fall apart and unfold.
14:53
The first thing Rick told my mom to do was go to RadioShack.
14:57
If anybody remembers RadioShack, yeah, sure do.
15:00
And yeah. And put a recording device on my
15:03
mom's phone because 1, he knows my mom.
15:06
Her brain was all scattered, especially at this moment in
15:09
time, of course. And he was like, we need to
15:12
listen every time you try to call Jordan, if you try to talk
15:15
to Ollie's family, we need to listen to figure out where
15:17
Lauren might be for any kind of hints.
15:20
If you call the police, we need to remember what they're telling
15:22
you to do. So because of that, I have hours
15:27
upon hours of conversations, which was so hard to listen to
15:31
because I'm in the midst of finishing a book that I've been
15:35
writing and going back and listening to my mom in those
15:39
desperate, desperate times, thinking she would never see me
15:42
again. But I can listen and hear how
15:46
God showed up over and over again in my story and how my mom
15:49
was connected to these men when everyone told her, you're never
15:54
going to get your daughter back, ma'am.
15:56
There's nothing that the United States can do to help you.
15:59
Oh, wow. Well, let's take a break right
16:02
there and then when we come back, you can tell us more about
16:05
that. But I think we'll play Shannon
16:08
Book. You're not alone.
16:09
He's a veteran artist and I think we'll play that real quick
16:12
and then we'll be right back with Lauren Burns.
20:26
Military broadcast radio, the station that's giving veterans a
20:30
voice Find. Us on the web at MB radio dot.
20:35
Opinions expressed in this program are those of the
20:38
speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions
20:43
of any entities they represent. Welcome back to the Tracer
20:47
Rounds podcast. And you're on military broadcast
20:49
radio where we're getting veterans a voice.
20:51
And tonight's voice is to Lauren Burns.
20:53
And we were just finding out that your mom was working to get
20:58
you back and she had engaged a service to help her find to find
21:03
you. And you're just getting to the
21:05
good point. Yes, yes, yes.
21:09
So at this point, there have been days of my mom calling the
21:14
police, calling the State Department.
21:15
Everybody kept saying we can't help you.
21:19
So Rick went ahead and jumped some lines that he he had
21:23
connections to get my mom in front of the grand jury in
21:27
Dallas, thinking that if they could at least get a warrant out
21:30
for my dad's arrest, then maybe if my dad came back to the
21:33
United States, they could, you know, put capture him and then
21:37
figure out where I was and go from there.
21:39
So Rick kept telling my mom, Kathy, we're probably just going
21:43
to get a warrant. That's all that's going to
21:45
happen. But you still we need still need
21:47
to go through this process. So she went and she went and she
21:53
stood before the grand jury and she told her story of my father
21:57
taking me. He's a Jordanian citizen.
22:00
I am his daughter. And everyone told my mom, I'm so
22:04
sorry, there's nothing we can do.
22:06
Yes, we can get a warrant, but that's all we can do.
22:08
And then, Terry, she broke down in front of that panel and she
22:12
said, can I just be really honest with you right now?
22:15
It's not fair that we spend billions of dollars in foreign
22:19
aid year after year and you're telling me you can do nothing to
22:21
help me get take my daughter back?
22:23
And she said everyone in that room shook their head and agreed
22:27
with her. And one man stood up.
22:30
His name is Al Zaponta. Al Zaponta is still a big deal.
22:35
He's still working in the political realm as of today.
22:39
And he gave my mom his business card.
22:42
And he said, I actually worked with the State Department.
22:45
If you're not happy, give me a call and I'll see what I can do.
22:49
And so at that moment, Terry, my mom was so distraught and beaten
22:53
down with everybody telling her no, that she didn't even really
22:56
realize who this man was standing before her.
23:00
So she put that business card in her wallet and she walked out
23:03
and and she told Rick, they can't help me.
23:06
She went back to the townhouse and she had already talked with
23:11
Beverly. Beverly had told her, and I have
23:13
this on a recording and Beverly told her, Kathy, you've got to
23:17
get away from all the noise and the chaos and be alone with God.
23:22
And you need to pray and focus on God because he's bigger than
23:27
your, your circumstances than any situation, any trial you
23:31
might be going through. And so my mom did, She grabbed
23:34
her Bible, she grabbed her bag. Rick and Deb were there to
23:37
handle the phones in case my dad called or someone called, but
23:41
they were, you know, doing the surveillance at at our
23:43
townhouse. My mom went to Fort Worth and
23:46
found some little motel room and checked herself in and she was
23:48
there for three days fasting and praying.
23:52
On that third day, God gave her a scripture verse and Daniel,
23:56
I'm going to read it to you, Daniel 1012.
23:59
And this is when Daniel was fasting for 21 days for the
24:03
Israelites. And the Angel Gabriel came to
24:05
Daniel and told Daniel, do not be afraid, Daniel.
24:10
Since the first day you set your mind to gain understanding and
24:15
to humble yourself before God, your words were heard.
24:20
It's like God was saying, Kathy, because you left the chaos and
24:25
you left all the noise and the fear and all the destruction.
24:28
And you came to spend time with me and put your eyes on me.
24:31
I see you and I've heard your prayers.
24:35
And Terry, my mom walked out of that townhouse or that motel.
24:39
She went back to the townhouse. And when Beverly shares this
24:42
Beverly with tears down her face, she's like, your mother
24:46
walked in and I was like, you don't look the same.
24:49
I don't know who this Kathy is, but you don't look the same.
24:51
And my mom said, I'm not the same because God told me I'm
24:54
going to get my daughter back. And I believe it.
24:57
She pulled out that business card and she called Al.
25:03
Al told my mom one week before Al was was working that jury
25:08
duty that that day he was in Washington, DC with his friend
25:12
Everett Alvarez. Everett Alvarez is well known.
25:16
I think he was held for 8 1/2 years, the second longest POW.
25:21
And he was very good friends with Al.
25:24
And so during this lunch a week before this grand jury meeting,
25:29
Everett is telling Al about a group of men that formed a
25:33
company. They were ex military Delta
25:36
Force Green Beret Army Rangers out of North Carolina.
25:40
And they had a company called CTU.
25:43
And their mission was to go to the Middle East and to rescue
25:47
hostages that have been taken, usually like people in the
25:50
corporate world, because they knew that area so well.
25:52
They had done lots of private work from movie stars and TV
25:57
production and movie production and all kinds of things, but
26:00
they had never rescued a child. My mom could not believe what
26:05
she was hearing. And no one can tell me that
26:07
that's not God, that Al happened to be in that room that day when
26:11
my mom was speaking and sharing her story.
26:15
So my mom said, I want to meet these men, right?
26:19
Can you imagine? And so, yeah, So Al reminded my
26:24
mom, Kathy, they've never rescued a child.
26:28
They do not work for the military anymore.
26:30
So if they're captured, we can't help. the United States will not
26:35
get involved. And it's going to cost a lot of
26:36
money to go get your daughter back and pull off this rescue
26:39
mission. And my mom was like, I don't
26:40
care. Get them on the phone.
26:42
I will pay for them to come to Dallas.
26:44
I want to meet them. So Dave and Don said yes, every
26:50
Alvarez actually went to their office there in North Carolina.
26:53
And Don when he shares the story, by the way, because I
26:57
started the Redeemed podcast, I reconnected with all of these
27:00
men. Oh my goodness, how cool is
27:03
that? I have heard them tell me
27:06
stories about my own rescue that I've never ever knew and I've
27:10
been able to tell them thank you.
27:11
I got to see them last September in person and hug their neck and
27:15
and meet their wives and it's just amazing.
27:19
Amazing. I can't even believe I'm saying
27:21
these things. But so Don and Dave flew to
27:26
Dallas and met my mom, and to hear them talk about my mom's
27:30
pretty cool because Dave is like, I've never met a woman
27:33
that was so gung ho and adamant and confident and prepared to go
27:38
get a little girl. She showed up with all the
27:42
photos of my dad, all of his family descriptions of like he
27:46
had like 12 siblings, their careers, their personality, like
27:50
everything she can remember. She drew by hand maps of the
27:54
town and what the house looked like.
27:55
So she was as prepared as could be.
27:58
So after meeting with her, they told her the same thing, Terry,
28:01
they were like, Kathy, we can't, we can't guarantee your safety.
28:05
We can't guarantee our safety or your daughter's.
28:08
And it's going to cost a lot of money.
28:09
And my mom was like, I don't care if you say yes, I will
28:12
figure out the money. And they said yes.
28:16
They said, yes, we will do this. We want to help you get your
28:18
daughter back that. Is so awesome.
28:22
I just can't even imagine which they went through what she went
28:26
through what you went through. I just can't imagine that all
28:28
these pieces came together at at the just the right time to make
28:32
this. You know, to to stage your your
28:36
rescue. It just, it's, it's God's timing
28:38
for sure. It's totally God's timing.
28:40
And now being a mom, I mean, for these men to leave their
28:44
families and to say yes for me, for a little girl that they
28:48
didn't even know, for a single mom that they didn't know, I
28:51
mean, it's huge. It changed my life forever.
28:55
So the first thing they had to do, Dave, they call him Grandpa.
28:59
I'm going to show you a picture of Dave.
29:02
He's dressed in disguise here. And then this is Dawn.
29:06
That's my mom. But there's Dawn.
29:10
Dave was the first one to go into Jordan.
29:12
His job was to figure out the lay of the land, try to put eyes
29:17
on me, try to find my father's home.
29:20
And when he got there, he realized that the pictures my
29:23
mom had given him were very outdated, and it was going to be
29:26
way harder than he even realized.
29:29
So while he was there, he couldn't find me, never could
29:33
find my father's home. But he started figuring out ways
29:35
to Get Me Out. He drove up towards Syria and
29:39
when he drove up that direction, he was like, there's no way
29:42
That's a war zone. It's so dangerous.
29:44
He drove towards Aqaba. It's a body of water between
29:47
Jordan and Israel. And he, he told me this in our
29:50
interview. He was like, well, Lauren, I
29:52
thought maybe I could just swim you, put you on my back and I
29:56
could swim the mile across and swim you to safety to Israel.
30:00
But once I got there, he's like, I saw all the guards and the
30:03
barbed wire fences and realized there's no way I would be able
30:06
to swim you across without getting shot at, right?
30:11
And then the other route was between Jordan and Israel, the
30:15
Allenby Bridge. It's a very secure border, The
30:20
King Hussein Bridge, I think is what they call it now.
30:23
And to try to get a border pass and to get us passports to be
30:27
able to go that route. And so that was the safest route
30:31
to be able to get us through. So that's what he was doing
30:35
while he was trying to find me and my father's house.
30:39
So he called Don and JD, and he was like, I need y'all to come.
30:43
Because he'd been in country too long.
30:46
And he was afraid that someone was going to figure out that he
30:48
shouldn't be there in this small little town.
30:51
And they were changing out rental cars.
30:53
They were changing out disguises.
30:55
And so Don and JD came in and their job was to try to get eyes
31:01
on me. And so same thing, Terry.
31:03
They had my mom's photos. They were searching the cities,
31:06
they were in the marketplace. They were up in the touristy
31:09
areas through the ruins, and day after day could not find me.
31:14
But one day Don and JD were standing on the street.
31:20
And JD recently passed away a couple months ago.
31:24
But I got to talk to him. I got to interview him and I got
31:29
to see him in person before he passed.
31:31
And I will always be grateful for that.
31:35
Picture of this is JD right here.
31:39
JD is the man that spotted me for the first time.
31:43
They were on the streets of Jarash.
31:45
And at this point he said, Lauren, I just started praying.
31:48
He's like, I did everything I knew how to do with all my
31:51
expertise and all my years. And then I was like, all right,
31:54
God, you got to help me find this girl.
31:57
And moments later, a school bus pulled up right where he was
32:01
standing on the sidewalk. And I have all of complexion
32:04
skin. I have darker hair, but my eyes
32:07
are like a bright bluish green. Instead, he turned, and he
32:11
looked in that bus window, and there I was sitting, and we
32:14
locked eyes with one another. And he knew it was me.
32:17
So he ran over to Dawn and was shaking him by the shoulders.
32:21
And Dawn's like, what's going on?
32:22
Because they're on high alert. And JD was like, I saw Lauren.
32:26
And Dawn was like, how do you know?
32:27
And he, he's like, I saw her eyes.
32:29
I know it's her. She's on that bus.
32:32
But the bus had already gotten away.
32:35
And they weren't able to track the bus because they lost it in
32:38
the narrow streets. But that's the first time they
32:42
laid eyes on me. And they knew I was actually
32:44
there in Jairash, and I wasn't in Lebanon OR somewhere else.
32:47
Oh. My goodness, we need to take a
32:50
quick break and then you can pick up the story again.
32:53
I am so intrigued by the story. I can't wait to read your book
32:56
because when, when is that going to come out?
32:59
I just signed with a literary agent this week, so I'm hoping
33:02
and praying the publisher will pick me up in this fall.
33:05
I just need to increase my e-mail list so that the
33:08
publisher will know yes people want to read it.
33:11
Awesome. Yes, Well, we'll help you with
33:12
that. So let's play sweet potato pie,
33:16
stand up, and then we'll be right back with John Burns.
35:42
Jerry Altman, United States Air Force. 2nd Lieutenant Zachary
35:47
Stead, Air Force. Military broadcast radio, the
35:56
station that's giving veterans a voice Find.
36:00
Us on the web at MB radio dot. Opinions expressed in this
36:05
program are those of the speakers and do not necessarily
36:09
reflect the views or positions of any entities they represent.
36:14
And welcome back to Military Broadcast Radio and the Tracer
36:17
Rounds podcast and my guest tonight, Lauren Burns.
36:20
And so Lauren, you are just talking about how one of your
36:24
rescuers had just spotted you on a bus.
36:26
And now the story picks back up there.
36:30
Yes, so they they call my mom at this point, my mom was in
36:34
Cyprus. So my mom had to go to
36:36
Washington, DC to try to get a passport for me because of
36:39
course my my father had my passport to get me into Jordan.
36:42
So how do you get it past another passport?
36:45
That's a whole another story. She spent about a week and 1/2
36:48
in Washington, DC trying to pull some strings.
36:52
So she flew into Cyprus. She was waiting in Cyprus with
36:55
another one of the men. His name's Jim Hatfield, and Jim
36:59
was staying with my mom in the in the meantime of the waiting
37:02
and waiting of, you know, what are we going to do?
37:04
How are we going to pull off this, this mission?
37:06
And so they call my mom and they said we have good news, we have
37:10
spotted Lauren, but we need your help.
37:12
We need you to come into Jarosh and help us find Ollie's house
37:17
because we hadn't been able to locate the home.
37:19
So my mom flew into Amman and the men met her there and she
37:25
was in disguise and she was very confident.
37:27
Terry, excited and fearful, all those emotions because this is
37:32
the closest she had been to me. I was gone for three months and
37:36
so this was the closest she had been to me in three months.
37:39
And she really thought she was going to be able to remember
37:42
what the house looked like and how to get there.
37:44
But just like with the photos, once she got there and they
37:48
started driving, my mom was like, she couldn't remember
37:52
anything. Nothing looked the same.
37:55
And so as Dawn was zigzagging the streets, my mom got in the
37:59
floorboard of the front seat and she just started praying out
38:02
loud with her eyes closed. And she's like, I didn't care if
38:05
the guys thought I lost my mind. I didn't know what else to do.
38:08
She started praying out loud. God, you haven't brought us this
38:11
far and these men this far to not even find the home.
38:14
You have to help me find this house.
38:17
And with her eyes closed, it's like God was just reminding her
38:20
of the streets that she had lost so many years before.
38:24
She began to remember the turns and the hills and the UPS and
38:27
the downs of the streets. And she began giving Don
38:30
directions. And he just listened.
38:32
Go left, go straight, turn right.
38:35
She finally looked up and when she looked out her window she
38:38
saw my dad's car sitting on the street with Texas license
38:42
plates. He had maxed out all his credit
38:45
cards and had shipped a a car to Jordan from Texas.
38:51
And my mom froze when she saw that.
38:55
And a couple blocks later, she finally told Don, I saw the car.
38:58
It's back there. So Don said, Kathy hides your
39:01
face. He turned the car around.
39:03
And as he drove back past the car, he looked and he saw my dad
39:07
come out of the building. And so that's how they located
39:12
the the house, my father's home. But again, Terry, nothing
39:15
happens in my story until people start praying.
39:18
Right. So then they realized, OK, the
39:23
house right next to a police station is in the middle of a
39:26
crowded city. It's too dangerous to try to go
39:28
into that house to get Lauren out.
39:31
So they started following, watching the school bus every
39:33
day to see what time did it pick me up, what time would I get
39:36
home, Where did the bus go? And there was one stop on the
39:40
outskirts of town, a little farmhouse where was one where we
39:45
picked up one of the kids. And they decided that would be
39:48
the best way to get me was outside of the city limits.
39:53
So that was the the goal of the story.
39:56
The day of the mission, Judy Feeney, Don's wife, she was
40:01
working back at CTU stateside, trying to run interference and
40:04
trying to figure out how to help from from the United States.
40:09
And she came up with a code word because you were very careful
40:11
how they communicated over the phones.
40:14
And Judy said. Dawn, tell Kathy that the code
40:18
word is the sun is shining, that everything is good to go, but
40:23
the sun is not SUN, it's SON. And when my mom heard that, she
40:29
was like, yes, the sun is Jesus. It was just one more reminder
40:34
that they're not alone in this crazy rescue mission.
40:38
So the day of the mission, there was 2 cars.
40:42
Dave Chatelier, he was the man that was first on the scene in
40:45
Jordan. His job was to watch the house
40:48
to make sure I actually got on the bus and I wasn't sick that
40:51
day or skipping school or whatever because you don't
40:53
hijack a school bus not knowing if the kids there, that'd be
40:56
really bad. Yes.
40:58
So, so that was his job. And then my mom was in the other
41:02
car with Don and JD. So as soon as Dave, I'm sorry,
41:08
as soon as Dave saw that I got on the bus, he drove over to
41:12
where the other group was and said Lauren's on the bus
41:15
missions ago. As the bus passed Don's car, Don
41:21
speed up when it parked at the farmhouse and he blocked the bus
41:25
so the bus couldn't move. Don got out and went over to the
41:29
the driver's side to the bus driver to cause a big commotion.
41:33
He was speaking in English to get him distracted while JD went
41:37
around to the accordion style passenger doors and he pried
41:41
those doors open. My mom was in disguise and
41:45
Terry. There's a lot of things I don't
41:47
remember because it was very traumatic event, but I will
41:51
never forget seeing my mom that day.
41:55
My mom came over to the bus and she spotted me through the
41:58
windows and she walked out to the window and she's tapping on
42:01
my window and she's motioning to me and I turn and I look at her
42:05
and all I could think Terry was it looks just like my mom.
42:08
But I must be dreaming because my mom's all the way in Dallas.
42:13
That can't be her because I just felt like I was never going to
42:17
see her again because he at this point, I'm speaking Arabic, I'm
42:20
going to school, I'm in saturated in the culture.
42:25
And I froze. And so my mom had to get on the
42:28
bus, push past the lady chaperone and pick me up because
42:32
I was in shock. As my mom's getting me off the
42:36
bus, the lady chaperone jumps on my mom's back.
42:39
My mom had to let go of my hand and she turned around and she
42:43
punched the woman in the nose because they taught my mom how
42:45
to fight a little bit before she went on this mission.
42:48
She was the only one out of all these guys that threw a punch.
42:50
Oh. Wow.
42:52
Yeah, so I'm really freaking out.
42:54
The lady's bleeding. Don sees what's going on.
42:57
JD got the keys out of the ignition and threw them in the
42:59
bushes so that they would go looking for the keys instead of
43:02
going to the police. And Don came over and helped my
43:06
mom and got me and in the floorboard of the car, got my
43:09
mom in the car, and then we speed off towards the bridge to
43:15
the border. Now, before this happened, my
43:18
mom had made fake reservations, would go looking for us at the
43:22
airport and not go to the border.
43:26
Dave. Was in the other.
43:28
Car. So we we actually switched cars.
43:31
So when we speed off, Dave met us a few blocks down the road.
43:35
We switched cars so that way no one would recognize our car.
43:38
And Dave had one of the most dangerous jobs.
43:40
He took the car we used to hijack the bus and he went back
43:44
towards Jordan to be a decoy for us back into the city.
43:48
So he got pulled over and he shares the details of what
43:53
happened to him on on the Redeemed podcast.
43:56
And I interviewed him, but they pulled him out of that car.
44:00
They pulled everything out of that car looking for me, looking
44:03
for any evidence of my mom. They surrounded him speaking in
44:08
Arabic and he just kept speaking in English, acting like a
44:10
tourist, saying, hey, where can I go fishing?
44:12
What's a good place to go look at the ruins as they are
44:16
interrogating him. And while this is happening, all
44:19
of a sudden, this is like 30 minutes goes by and he hears on
44:22
the radios, on the police radio, ALIA airport.
44:25
ALIA Airport. Terry, they left him in a cloud
44:29
of dust on the side of the road. And all of the officers went to
44:32
the airport looking for me because they shut down the whole
44:35
airport trying to find me and my mom and Dave was able to get
44:39
away. That's awesome.
44:41
That's God. Totally God and when Dave
44:44
shares. The story he has told me, he's
44:46
like, Lauren, I have thought about your story because I'm 44
44:49
now. So this happened, what, 37 years
44:51
ago? He's like, I've thought about
44:54
how many ways this should have gone wrong, but God had a plan
44:57
for your life. And I'm like, well, Dave, that's
44:59
why I'm trying to share this story of what you guys did to
45:03
get me back. So as that's going on, we had no
45:08
clue that Dave was pulled over because we are headed to Israel.
45:12
And the IT was so thick with fog that Dawn could barely see the
45:18
front of the car. And so we could only go so fast.
45:21
And my mom's holding me. I'm burning up with fever.
45:25
I won't even speak. And the guys had prepared my
45:27
mom. She's probably going to go in to
45:28
shop. This is OK.
45:29
It's it's normal. She's, you know, I'm going
45:31
through trauma and my mom's just holding me praying.
45:36
And all the sudden my mom looks and she's like, what is that
45:39
bright light in the distance? And Don said, well, that's the
45:43
sun. The sun is shining over Israel.
45:46
So it's like even in the midst of that panic, because it was
45:49
like a 45 minute hour drive from where we were needed to go, it's
45:54
like God was like, Kathy, I'm with you, I'm going to see you
45:57
through this. So when you get to the border,
46:00
you can't drive. Well, back then you couldn't
46:03
drive over. You had to leave your car in on
46:06
the Jordanian side and get on a bus.
46:09
Then they look through your paperwork, the passports.
46:11
My mom worked so hard to get the border passes, all your stamps,
46:14
all the things. We were on that bus for like
46:17
30-40 minutes waiting and waiting.
46:19
And there are big machine gun towers and barbed wire fences.
46:25
The men had had walked all of that area because they had
46:29
contacts on the Israeli side that that people were helping
46:32
them, showing them where the booby traps were, the tank
46:34
traps, all the things. But still, Don and JD are like,
46:39
what are we going to do if they realize who we are?
46:42
So they're on high alert, scouting everything.
46:45
And the bus starts to go and drive.
46:47
And as it's driving, we get to the middle of the bridge.
46:52
And when you get to the middle of the bridge, a Jordanian bus
46:54
driver and Jordanian soldier, they switch out with the Israeli
46:57
bus driver and Israeli soldier and they drive you on over into
47:00
Israel. Right after they did that switch
47:06
and the bus driver switched. As we're going over and you see
47:09
the Israeli flag flying in the distance, there was a huge
47:13
commotion where we had just left.
47:15
They just found out that we were not at the airport, but we were
47:18
on the bus. But Terry, at this point it was
47:21
too late. We were in Israel and there's
47:23
nothing they could do. We got off that bus.
47:27
My mom like literally fell to the ground, kissed the ground.
47:31
All her emotions crying. She's hugging me, she's crying.
47:35
There is a group of women there, and they go over to JD, and JD
47:39
is this big, handsome, tall guy, and he's got tears in his eyes.
47:43
And the blades are like, is that little girl OK?
47:46
Is the woman OK? And JD begins to tell them that
47:49
little girl was taken from her mother three months ago, and we
47:52
just brought her home to safety. And the women start jumping up
47:55
and down saying, praise you, Jesus.
47:57
We've come to the Holy Land and we've seen a miracle.
48:00
And they come around us and start hugging us and praying
48:03
with us. And it's like, even then, God
48:05
had like a celebration waiting for us this whole time on the
48:08
other side of that bridge, right?
48:10
That is amazing. I mean, everything had to go
48:13
just so in order to, to pull that off.
48:16
I mean, like nothing could have, you know, been left or right of,
48:20
of where you were or something bad would have, you know,
48:24
transpired. You would have been stopped or
48:26
you would have been, you know, something would have happened.
48:28
But that was just God intervening and making sure all
48:32
the pieces fit together just like a puzzle.
48:34
Yeah, from the start of. Meeting Al in the courtroom, I
48:38
mean, just every step and going back and listening to the
48:42
cassette tapes and just seeing God's hand and all of it.
48:45
And these men, these men saying yes and for me to tell them
48:50
thank you and hug them and getting that chance before JD
48:53
passed away. I just started sharing my story
48:55
a year ago for these men to still be here for me to share
49:00
with them and tell them thank you and tell them, hey, I'm a
49:02
mom now and I'm a wife and I have, I'm a physical therapist
49:05
and all the things I could do because of them saying yes.
49:08
So for the person that's listening, thank you for your
49:12
sacrifice. You'll never know the lives that
49:15
you have changed because of your yes.
49:18
Wow, that's. Powerful.
49:21
It really is powerful. You know, it's like, you know,
49:23
first responders and somebody saving somebody's life and then
49:27
somebody gets to go back years later and say, you know, you've
49:29
made a difference in my life, thank you for saving me.
49:31
And you've got that opportunity. And not too many really do get
49:35
that opportunity to go back and thank those that really helped
49:37
them. You know, they it's like Travis
49:41
was talking about. They put you on your trajectory
49:44
of your life. You know, you are where God
49:46
wants you to be and you're doing what God wants you to do and
49:49
you're telling your story the way God wants you to tell it to
49:52
make a difference for somebody else.
49:55
Yeah, Thank you. I.
49:57
You know, just to take a minute to honor JD and his family, like
50:01
I got to go have lunch with his son not long ago 'cause he was
50:04
visiting San Antonio and to sit with his son and to say to your
50:09
does his grandkids, do your kids know what their grandfather did?
50:13
Please, for sure, please tell Yes, yes.
50:17
And that's so honoring to me. And to tell my boys, you know,
50:20
these men risk their life for your mom before I even thought
50:24
to be a mother, right? Wow.
50:27
That's an incredible story. I just, I can't imagine how
50:30
strong your mom was to do all this, to really put these wheels
50:34
into motion by the just the people she was in contact with
50:38
and the people that she knew and, and who they knew.
50:40
Because it's just a series of events of who all knew somebody
50:44
else, who knew somebody else, who knew somebody else.
50:46
But it's all God's hand touching all of this networking across
50:51
all these things that that brought you home.
50:54
So we're really glad you got home.
50:57
Thank you. We're really glad you're here.
51:00
We have about. 9 minutes left of the show.
51:02
Is there anything you'd like to tell us about what you're doing
51:05
with your podcast or what you're doing with your book?
51:07
Or is there any more like TV in the works or anything like that?
51:13
Well, yes, thank you for the opportunity.
51:15
I am going to, I just signed with a book literary agent and
51:19
we are going to, in September coming up, go to publishers to
51:23
see if someone will pick up the book, the manuscript.
51:26
And so being able to support that is if you want to help
51:30
support this, I would love if you would share your e-mail.
51:32
Laurenburns.net is a great place to be able to subscribe to my
51:37
newsletter and share your e-mail with me because that will help
51:41
publishers know, yes, people want to hear this story.
51:44
They want to hear how these veterans saved you and they want
51:47
to hear these God moments. The reason I'm sharing the movie
51:51
so Desperate Rescue, the Kathy Mahone story, you can find it on
51:54
YouTube. You're not going to see my mom
51:57
fasting and praying. You're not going to see how the
51:59
Lamberts are involved in this. You're not going to see and hear
52:03
the details of what these men did.
52:06
And so that's why I'm running the book.
52:08
I also share in the book what life looked like after Terry
52:12
because we had to change your last name.
52:14
I had to live in hiding. I moved, I think like 14 times
52:17
by the time I was in high school.
52:20
And I had to learn how to forgive my father.
52:23
I reconnected with him because I wanted, I had every little girl
52:27
wants to know who their dad is. Every little girl wants to know
52:30
who's going to walk them down the aisle when they get married
52:32
one day. I had a lot of father wounds,
52:36
deep father wounds. Miranda's dad, Rick was my my go
52:41
to dad for many years. Every Father's Day I would send
52:44
him a card because I hated Father's Day.
52:46
But I loved Rick and I was like, can you be my dad?
52:49
You know? And my mom did did remarry when
52:52
I was 12 and I had an amazing stepfather.
52:55
But the book talks about forgiving, and until I can learn
52:59
how to forgive my dad for what he did, I could not heal.
53:04
I could not heal past the anger and the hurt and the trauma, and
53:08
it took years. That's why the Bible says 70 * 7
53:11
is how many times you need to forgive.
53:13
And God had to walk me through that.
53:15
But when I could finally forgive and let go of that anger, that's
53:19
when my healing began. And that's how I could become
53:22
whole. So that's why it's called the
53:24
Redeemed Podcast, because Redeemed means to restore and to
53:28
heal. And so that's why I chose that
53:31
name for the podcast. I love it.
53:34
So you've been doing? The podcast for about a year
53:37
last April is when I. Started it, yeah, so about a
53:40
year. You can find it on Spotify,
53:43
YouTube, Apple. It's been the best thing ever
53:47
about the whole podcast is connecting with these men and
53:50
sharing and and hearing them tell the story.
53:53
And my mom, my mom is also. I interview her.
53:56
Terry. That was hard.
53:58
She we had to wait a while for her to be ready.
54:00
We both cry together and I cry a lot.
54:03
It's OK. It's OK.
54:05
Yeah. It just means.
54:06
You're a human and you you have that compassion and you
54:10
understand, you know the dynamics of how this all fit
54:13
together and was the perfect God moment.
54:17
I say I earn these tears, so you.
54:19
Might as well share them, you know.
54:21
Indeed, I agree with you. Oh my goodness, it's been such a
54:26
fun time having you on here and having you Share your story
54:29
because I'm sure that so many people will be touched and moved
54:31
by it, you know, And it really just takes somebody stepping up
54:35
and say, I'll help, you know, take me.
54:37
And that's what we do as citizens of the US and that's
54:40
what we do as soldiers and sailors and airmen and Marines.
54:43
We all say, take me, you know, we'll serve.
54:46
We'll be the ones because it really takes somebody to stand
54:49
up and really, you know, spinning.
54:53
The gap for their brothers, basically.
54:56
Yeah. And Terry, what I learned
54:57
because I. Asked JD's son, Sam.
54:59
He's also in the military. I asked him, Did your dad share
55:03
these stories? And the answer is no.
55:05
I'm learning. You guys are humble.
55:07
Like, too humble. You don't share.
55:10
And so he actually had to sit his dad down and say, dad, I
55:13
want my boys to know the kind of man you are.
55:16
And so share your stories. They're powerful, amazing
55:20
stories. Yeah, I mean a lot.
55:23
Of a lot of the veterans really don't want to talk about what
55:26
they've done, but our President H or Joel, he's on and he said
55:31
thank you Lauren for sharing your story.
55:34
You're very welcome. Thank you for the.
55:35
Platform to be able to share that's huge and and we're happy
55:40
to. Share your story and we'll be
55:42
happy to share your book too. So when it comes out, when you
55:44
pick up a publisher, just let us know.
55:46
And we'd we'd all love to have you on our programs, you know,
55:50
supporting your book because we really want to get your story
55:53
out there and we really want to celebrate how your whole
55:57
retrieval out of Jordan came about.
55:59
So thank you. That's such an awesome story.
56:03
I just moved to tears. I, I, I didn't know I was going
56:06
to cry. But yes, thanks for going with
56:09
me. Yes, ma'am.
56:12
Well, I appreciate you coming on tonight and I think we'll go
56:15
ahead and in the show now and unless you've got something else
56:18
you want to put out some any kind of word of advice or
56:21
anything you'd just like to share as we close the biggest
56:25
word of. Advice I think I can say is
56:28
don't let forgiveness steal your joy.
56:31
Don't let forgiveness stop you from healing.
56:34
That is the biggest message. I don't care what you've been
56:37
through. I don't even know your story.
56:39
Whatever you've gone through, do the work to be able to forgive
56:44
and forgiveness. I couldn't do it on my own.
56:45
I had to lean on God. God had to walk me through that.
56:48
So don't give up on trying to forgive that area, that person
56:53
that hurt you. That is such good advice.
56:56
You know, as we were talking a little bit before the show and
56:59
it's, you know, if you don't forgive, it's like you're
57:01
dragging some kind of boat anger along anchor along with you.
57:05
And yes, you're making forward progress, but it's less than you
57:08
would make if you just let go of that anchor, let go of that hurt
57:12
and heal yourself or have God heal you.
57:14
You know, pray for forgiveness for that person that wronged you
57:18
or even if you know, it's even if you don't even know really
57:24
what happened, but you just let it all go.
57:26
You're like, I don't know who's involved.
57:28
I don't know what's involved, but I just know I need to
57:30
forgive this situation, whatever this is.
57:32
And then you can move on and start to heal from that.
57:35
And you know, God has a plan for all of us if we just ask him
57:38
what it is and follow his lead. So well, thank you so much for
57:43
being on here tonight. I really appreciate it.
57:45
We're looking forward to your podcast redeem what?
57:48
What nights is it on or when is it on?
57:50
Is it like program certain nights of the week or how is it
57:53
anytime? Go to Spotify and.
57:56
The early episodes, I think the earlier episodes are the guys
58:00
interviews if you want to listen to those.
58:01
They're like the 1st 10 episodes or so.
58:04
OK, well judge me, I've gotten. Better.
58:07
I'm on like episode 60, so I think they're going to be
58:10
awesome, you know, it's all. It's always a work in progress.
58:13
I'm a work in progress. So, you know, I, I take little
58:17
tips and hints from everybody. So I think we're all learning.
58:20
So I, you know, I'm, I'm not here to judge for sure.
58:23
OK, good. Thank you.
58:25
All right. Well, this is Teresa.
58:27
Around signing off and thank you so much, Lauren.
58:29
We appreciate you and God bless you.
58:32
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for tuning in to
58:38
Military Broadcast Radio. As we wrap up today's show, we
58:43
want to remind you that the podcast of today's episode will
58:47
be available right after we go off the air.
58:50
So if you missed any part of the show or want to listen again, be
58:55
sure to check it out. And remember, we're here to
58:59
support and honor our veterans. Your stories and experiences
59:05
matter, and we are committed to giving you a platform to share
59:10
them. That's right, we are here to
59:13
give our veterans a voice. So don't forget to catch the
59:17
podcast and stay connected with us giving our veterans a voice.