Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Killers Amongst Us: 19-year-old artistic beauty disappears after car found abandoned on bridge. What happened to Sarah Stern? (Part 2)

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Killers Amongst Us: 19-year-old artistic beauty disappears after car found abandoned on bridge. What happened to Sarah Stern? (Part 2) · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hi, guys, Nancy Grace here Welcome back to Killers amongst Us,
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: the production of iHeartMedia and Crime Online. Sarah Stern a
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: beautiful teen girl who loses her mom after a fight
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: with cancer and was trying to find her way in
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: the world. She disappears from home without a trace, leaving
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: behind so many questions and so few clues. We start
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: at two forty five am the morning of December three,
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: twenty sixteen, an abandoned car found on any Jersey Bridge.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: Nancy Grace, Killers amongst Us? Did the choler id that
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: you know in the answered it was the Sheriff's department
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: because I got a recording that said that the hours
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: are from nine am to five pm and call back
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: or leave a message. So right there I knew it
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: was you know, it was called from an official phone,
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: but didn't have any details. And that's that's how the
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: whole thing started. And you know, I hadn't been able
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: to get in touch with Sarah, so you know, I
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: thought something at that point might be wrong. How long
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: had you been trying to reach her? From about ten
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: thirty the evening before, so that would have been Friday
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: night going into Saturday morning. Michael Stern. This is Sarah's dad, Michael.
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: That evening. You started trying to contact her around ten
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: thirty PM, which would have been I guess a Friday night. Okay,
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: let me go back just a little. My Sarah's grandma,
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: my mother, had called me and said she hadn't been
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: able to get in touch with Sarah all day and
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: she was staying at my sister's house because she had
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: covering from being in the hospital, so she was over
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: there for ten or twelve days to recover, so she
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: wasn't home. And you know, she talked to Sarah every
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: day and she had seen Sarah during the week, but
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: she said she haven't been able to get in touch
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: with her. So I said, well, it's Friday night at
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: ten thirty. You know, she's either sleeping or she's out,
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: or her phones died or something and she's charging it.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Sarah always had things going on, seem like twenty four
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: hours a day, so she'd be up at four o'clock
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: in the morning talking to people in Australia or London
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: or California. So okay, wait, wait, wait, wait, I just
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: got to ask you. It's neither here nor there, but
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: why is Sarah up at four o'clock in the morning
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: talking to people in Australia. Well, they were friends. They
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: were her YouTube and the internet friends that she had
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: met at vidcom, Buffer, Fast book Con, Comic Con. Okay,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: wait wait wait wait wait, I'm learning what. Tell me
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: about all the cons she went to. Well, VidCon, which
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: you know is in I gets in different places. I
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: don't know. There was California, Anaheim, a couple of times,
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: New York, Toronto, so she was kind of jumping around
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: all over the place along with gone to the people
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: she liked that Grace hell Big and Jenna Marbles and
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Hannah Heart autograph parties and things like that. That they
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: would have a bookstore, signings and stuff. So she was
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: into the very heavily into internet YouTube and you know,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: the social media. Celebrate online video with your friends, meet
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: your favorite creators, have the time of your life, create
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: better content, grow your channel, break into the industry, meet
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: fellow creators. Wow. Okay, so I'm learning all about what
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: this is VidCon and I guess everyone, all the YouTubers,
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: all the TikTokers, all of them show up at vidcan
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: So do I have an understanding of what VidCon is?
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: Michael Stern. Yes, that's exactly the way it is. It's
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: the kind of an international national media thing where it
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: could be local or a distant And Sarah had friends
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: in Australia, London. Oh yeah, I'm looking at it right now.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Australia London are the ones they mentioned. So she's all
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: over the map. Now you mentioned another thing she liked
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: to go to. What was that started with a bee
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: as a brother? Well, let's see, there was a buffer fast,
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: which is another Internet what's that? But I guess I'm
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: gonna have to look that up too, don't don't judge me.
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: Did you say buffer fast? Buffer fast? Yeah, that's a
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: you know when sometimes when you're downloading a program or
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: a video or something, it buffers, you know, just you
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: see the little circle going around. Well, buffer Fest was
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: kind of a takeoff on that saying, where it was
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  Speaker 1: an Internet thing where you just learned about the different
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: things that were going on in it. I looked it up.
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: I have to look everything up. Buffer Festival is a
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: four day theatrical showcase of theatrical screenings that celebrates video
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: premiers from acclaimed digital creators. Okay, yep, that says annually
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: in Toronto, or Ontario. Okay, so she's all about digital
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: and see, well, the reason I'm curious about this, Michael
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: Stern and I'm going to get back to her car
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: being found is Bobby, you can't help me out here.
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: I need everybody on this. The bigger her circle is, okay,
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: the more people we've got to look at that may
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: know where she is or what happened to her, see
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: what I mean. So it's not no longer just let's
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: go at the next door neighbor. It's let's go on
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: her all of her devices, her phone, her laptop, her desktop,
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: her iPad, and who is she talking to? Who are
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: her best friends online? She's heavily, heavily involved in and
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: in a fun, fun, good way in creating video content.
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: Bobby Chicon, I mean that's a little overwhelming for an
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: investigator because there's so many directions in which to go
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: looking for information about where is Sarah? Do I have
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: to go to Vicon and buffer Fest? I mean, it
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: really does. It's created in a complete new way of
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: having to investigate these cases that wasn't in existence when
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: I started in this business. And and so you always
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: look at the world of the missing person, the world
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: of whoever you're looking at. And while the Internet has
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: made the world such a smaller place, in one way,
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: it's now completely made you know, the pool of people
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: you have to look at and investigate much much larger
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: for investigators. And to doctor Bethany Marshall's psychoanalyst joining me
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: out of California, Doctor Bethany, this is like a whole
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: new world. As Bobby Checkon said, it wasn't like that
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: when I first became entered the FBI. Now everybody's world
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  Speaker 1: has a blown up. And as an investigator, I'm trying
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: to find out where Sarah and I find out she
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: goes to buffer Fast and vig Con and a lot
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: of other places, and she's up at four am talking
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: to her friends in other countries, specifically Ontario and Toronto.
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: I mean that opens up a whole world. Are people
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: creating really alternate IDs online? Well, this is the digital
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  Speaker 1: version of a young woman, nineteen year old young woman
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: traveling all over the world and meeting hundreds and thousands
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: of people searching for that one person who may have
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: targeted her, become obsessed with her, started to stalk her,
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: becomes a little bit like a needle in a Haystack, Nancy.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: When I started on your show on HLN many years ago,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: we kept covering thirteen fourteen, fifteen year olds who had
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: been abducted at the hands of predators they had met online.
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  Speaker 1: And the conventional wisdom Van was, you know, when your
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: child goes online to do their homework or to look
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: on the internet, make sure they're in the living room
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: with the screen facing outwards so everybody can see what
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: they're doing. That was the simple advice we gave back then.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: That does not even apply anymore. There are so many devices.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: And as I'm listening to Sarah Stern's father, she was
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: at always these festivals and all these different modes of
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: communication on the Internet. And let's be clear that let's
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: be clear we're talking about the festivals she gets to.
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  Speaker 1: I'm not talking about the Fry Festival or Burning Men
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: or Coachella where everybody's high and drunk sleeping around. These
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: are actual content, creative festivals as they call them, where
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: you premiere new theatrical entries online. I mean, it's a
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: very creative and positive things she's doing. She's not high
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: as a kite and some tent out at Coachella. That's
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: not what Sarah Stearns about Bethany. It sounds a like
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: a shakespeare festival, you know, got a bunch of I
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  Speaker 1: don't know that I go that far. I don't know
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: that I go that far. But okay, so Michael, Michael,
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  Speaker 1: I want to go back to Sarah's dad with me
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: right now, Michael Stern, tell me about her. I mean,
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: that's that's quite the swing of the pendulum, me saying
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: she's not at Coachella, you know, where everybody's drunk and
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: high and the Bethan goes. Yes, it's like Shakespearean festivals.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: I don't think I'd go that far. Michael, Just tell
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: me about her. Sarah's kind of hard to describe, but
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: she loved the media and art and creating a you know,
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: of of videos and things like that, little vignettes, and
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: that's what she was interested in. She liked the podcast
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: type of thing. That's Grace Helbig and Jason soul of
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: Meda I think it was, and he was Jason was
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: one of the people that as soon as he found
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: out Sarah was missing. And I don't know how big
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: it's following is. It's probably a million, million and a
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: half people or something, and Grace Helbig has three million
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: or so followers. They were right away, you know, within
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: a few days, they were out there, you know, asking
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: for help to you know, find there. You know, when
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: you said, Michael that Sarah was hard to describe, I
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: kind of know what you mean because I've researched her
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: and talked to so many people about Sarah. I mean,
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: on one hand, she's this happy, go lucky teen girl.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: On the other hand, I look at the photos. She's
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: very into digital creation and photos and some of her
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: um self photos and I'm not going to say selfies
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: because they look as if they're taken by a professional photographer,
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: like she's silhouetted looking out into like an afternoon sky.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: I mean, they're very thoughtful and kind of deep. And
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: she'd been through a lot because she lost her mother
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: so at her very young age. You guys had already
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: battled a terminal illness, and Sarah lost her mom at
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: a very young age. What happened, Michael, Well, Sarah was fifteen,
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: you know, she was younger. Their mother upper with the
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: answer for about six years, with five and a half
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: six years, and you know, she was on the road
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: to recovery, and then she had a recurrence and subsequently
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: within a year she passed away, and Sarah at that
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: point turned to art and creation, art as a drawing
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: and photography, and also I would say film and the
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: whole media, television kind of John, I want to ask
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: you a question, Michael. You know, I know people ask
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: you about Sarah all the time, but I want to
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: talk for a moment about Sarah's mom because hearing you
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: describe her illness, how she had fought it for so
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: many years, and I thought had beaten it, and then
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: it came back. I remember when they called me and
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: told me that I had a melanoma, and as you know,
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: is the most aggressive form of skin cancer. And my
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: first thought was, Oh, dear God, please please just let
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: me stay here and be with the twins. Just let
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: me stay here. And I continue that prayer so so
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: many days of the week, and I'm imagining Sarah's mom
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: just wanting to stay alive. Sarah's your only child, to
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: just stay alive, to get her through school, to get
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: her through the bumpy road of life, and help her.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: You know, when you finally go to heaven, you know
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: you've done everything you can for your child to try
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: as best as you can to give them a happy
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: life so that they're set and they're on the path
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: to happiness, whatever that may be. And I'm just imagining
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: Sarah's mom struggling, just trying to stay alive. For Sarah, yeah,
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: it was it was a tough It was a tough
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: fight the last year. And you know that you just
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: when you don't get any better and you go through
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: treatments and operations and chemo, and it just it's a
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: tough thing to go through. And you know, Sarah, we
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: try to keep things as normal as possible, and you know,
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Steady even killed, so it didn't seem, you know, so dire,
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: which it didn't seem like it was a dire in
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: the beginning, but as months went by, things didn't get
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: Things just weren't getting better. They were just progressively getting worse.
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: And it was tough for Sarah. You know, she saw
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: her mom. You know, I couldn't do what she used
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: to do, and you know, it was tired all the time,
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: a lot of doctor's appointments, So it was tough for Sarah.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: When her mom passed away, she kind of found herself.
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: She had some very good teachers in high school, photography
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: and art teachers who took Sarah under their their wing
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: and somehow Sarah just developed his talent within a year
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: and she just became a brilliant artist and photographer, which
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: was amazing to make. I mean, I've never I've never
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: seen a transformation like that. She went from Harley being
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: able to you know, throw up, you know, a picture
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: with a straight line with the rule or as I
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: would say, she just became a brilliant artist in any media,
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: didn't matter what it was, pencil, watercolor, animate, whatever she
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: took her hand to. She just put her entire being
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: into that. And that's how she I think um kind
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: of lived to prove, you know that she could be somebody,
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: you know, and you know, take the pain away from
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: her mother passing away. And I think that's what she did.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: And she just threw herself into art and media and
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: she she liked it and that's what kept her. That's
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: what kept her going. I mean, I've looked at so
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: many of her pieces, her photography especially, and a lot
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: of her pencil sketches, and they're incredible. In fact, one
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: of her dog, it looks like the dog is about
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: to jump off the page. It's so lifelike, and I
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: was marveling at her talent. When you said you tried
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: to keep everything as normal as possible, as your wife battled,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: what do you mean by that? Well, just you know routines,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: you know, get up, go to school, you know, make lunch,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: take a launch with you or you know, buy lunch
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: in school, and you know whatever the activities where sare
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: was on the swim team for a season two along
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: with her softball. She started UM softball and her freshman
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: year on the varsity team and stayed on the varsity
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: team throughout school with softball, so that was a good
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: uh you know, she just she liked that, she liked
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: the camaraderie with the team and stuff, and you know,
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: so we kept everything as normal as possible for mother
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: would go to the games when she felt up to it,
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: you know, the home games and stuff. So everything seemed
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: normal except for you know, the elms. So it's just
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: kind of you know, you don't want, you don't want
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: to start changing lifestyles with a with you know, with
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: a young child, you know, even though there is a y.
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: So that's we just try to keep possible. We're talking
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: about Sarah Stern's mom, Carla Stern, and I'm speaking with
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: Sarah's dad, Michael Stern, and he is recounting the call
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: he received down in Florida. He's only gone for seven days,
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: He's just seen his daughter, and suddenly, after not being
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: able to reach her since about ten thirty that evening,
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: he gets a three am ish call telling him her
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: car is found on the side of a bridge. When
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: I'm thinking about this bridge and I'm looking at it,
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: her car's part over to the far right. There is
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: an emergency lane of sorts, so it's not blocking traffic,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: which makes me wonder. Also to our special guests joining
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: US crime and Court reporter for NJA dot com and
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: star ledger Alex Napolello, Alex, with the car pulled over
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: to the side right there in that particular neck of
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: the woods. It could have sat there for hours and
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: nobody have noticed it. It wasn't blocking traffic. It was
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: late at night when it was called in around three am.
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: And what can you tell me about the area. I mean,
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: it's near Asbury Park, right, Isn't that where Bruce Springsteen
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: started in the Stone Pony and Neptune Beach. What can
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: you tell me about the area. Correct. So, Neptune City
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: is a very tight Neptune city, thank you. It's a
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: very tight knit community. At the heart of the Jersey Shore.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: About two miles north is Asbury Park, where as you said,
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: famously Bruce Springsteen got his start playing the clubs in Asbury.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: Just to the south of Neptune City is Belmar, which
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: is an extremely popular summer destination. It's where many people
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: in New Jersey go to vacation. They grow up, kids
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: grew up going on the boardwalk in Delmar, and so
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: this is a place that's known to practically everyone in
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: the state and even across state lines in New York
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: and Pennsylvania. But Neptune City is a community where everyone
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: knows each other. The Stern family, as Michael could tell you,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: was well known in the area because they owned and
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: operated an independent bookstore there, and so in turn, Sarah
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: was a well known team in the area. She worked
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: at local businesses in the area, and so she was too.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: She was well known. But the bridge where the car
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: was discovered, as you said before, was off to the side.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: It could go unnoticed for hours because it wasn't in
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: any of the travel lanes. It was simply pulled over.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: I just last week, I was driving over the Route
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: thirty five bridge and there was a truck pulled over,
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: and I didn't even think twice about it. I just
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: kept on driving because it's not that uncommon. You know,
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: when people here Neptune Beach or the Jersey Shore, everybody
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: thinks of the reality show the Jersey Shore. This area
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: could be could not be further from that stereotype, couldn't
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: be further because this area where you guys live, Michael,
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: it's beautiful. There's beautiful yards, very well kept, tidy, perfectly
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: manicured homes, really nice residential areas where you see people
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: out walking and jogging and children out with their scooters.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: It's nothing at all like the Jersey Shore gang where
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: everybody's passed out drunk on the beach. It was NonStop party.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: This is a real family area. Do I have that right, Michael? Yeah,
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: pretty much family area. You know. They the Asbury Park
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: is going through like a gentrification and it's coming back,
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: you know, from where it was years ago. Kind of
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: buildings falling apart, a lot of million dollars investments going
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: in along the beach. So it attracts a lot of
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: people to the area, and Asbury Park also very small
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: Ocean Grove which is part of Neptune. And then you've
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: got Bradley Beach and av On, Belmar Spring Lake. So
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of small, small towns. If you if
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: you're driving through, you can pass through, you know, in
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: ten minutes you could pass through five towns. So but
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: it's you know, there's some middle class, some you know,
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: some upper class areas, and it's just a good mix
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: of people and businesses and it's just you know, it's
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: a nice place. The beaches nearby. Yeah, And I guess
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: the point of my analysis of the area is, you know,
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: I see everything through the eyes of a felony prosecutor
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: and crime victim, and immediately you know, doctor Bethany Marshall,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: psychoanis out of LA went wrong or right? When you
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: see a beautiful neighborhood and children out on their scooters
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: and people walking and cars pulling into the driveway, it
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: gives you a sense of security and safety. And that's
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: the backdrop for finding her car stashed on the side
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: of the road with the keys in it. I mean,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: this is an area where there's a low crime rate.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: So right or wrong we start trying to figure out
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: where Sarah. She's not in her car, and she's left
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: the keys in the car. Nancy. A part of good
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: mental health is living one's life with the illusion that
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: the world is a safe place. This is one of
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: the things we're taught at the beginning of our training
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: as psychologists and psychoanalysts that people who come into treatment
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: who are nervous that their car's going to plunge off
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: the road, or they're going to lose all their money,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: they're going to be a victim of a crime usually
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: have anxiety disorders. So in a case like this, you
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: have a car parked on the bridge, you have a tranquil, calm,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: beautiful neighborhood. As you said, children on scooters. You want
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: people in a community like that to live with an
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: illusion of safety because that imparts a sense of well being.
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: And furthermore, when someone then sees a car on the
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: side of the road, they're not going to think the
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: worst in a case like this, They're going to think,
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: you know, well, you know, maybe somebody got sleepy or tired,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: so they pulled over to take a nap because they
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: didn't think they should keep driving. So in an unfortunate way.
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: This illusion of safety or that nothing bad can never happen,
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: is the kind of environment in which these kinds of
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: crimes can blossom. Because nobody's looking over their shoulder. Nobody's
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: looking to say, is somebody's stalking Sarah, is somebody obsessed
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: with her? Is somebody targeting her? They're just thinking of
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: a beautiful, young, artistic woman in a tranquil community, enjoying
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: her life. That's what people are thinking. Oh and I
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: don't know if you've seen her picture, but I've studied
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: it very carefully. The long black, silky hair, she had
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: perfect skin and beautiful eyes. And she was I mean
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: compared to me. He's five one. She seems tall and
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: thin and statue. She looks athletic. So Bobby Chakohn, with
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: that in mind, with the area in mind that Alex
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: and Michael are describing, you don't think immediately crime. I
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: mean in that area, I would think disabled car. Well,
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: you're trying not to jump to any conclusions, and as
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: an investigator you go in with you know, open eyes.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: But she also don't want to go in too naive
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: because as we say, we say, you know, in those
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: early minutes of an investigation like that, if you don't
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: handle it properly, there are things and steps that you
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: lose if you don't take them, and you can never
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: go back, and so you do want to, you know,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: an investigator. This is why maybe investigators suffer from you know,
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: certain um anxiety disorders. But we always you know, think
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: the worst and hope for the best, because if you
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: don't think the worst and you you skip steps, you
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: could lose valuable evidence and valuable information that you just
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: won't be able to go back and get. And so
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: when you see a car like that and it's parked
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: there and it has the keys in it, you know
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: you do, it does start to raise, you know, that
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: level of concern And why would you know, why would
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: the person leave the keys if this is a disabled
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: car and they're going to help you, would you would
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: secure the vehicle before you walk away. So that's exactly
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: that's my first that's my first thing that would would
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: elevate my concern in this game. Take a listen to
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: our Friantoni Yates at Channel seven w ABC our top
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: story this half hour, the mystery of a missing nineteen
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: year old for mom of Kelly Sarah Stearn was last
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: seen late Friday nights. Now her car was found, but
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: searches for her attempts to turn it up, and now
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: our family and authorities upper reward will help lead to clues.
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: New Jersey reported Tony eight in Bellmar the very latest
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: on this story. Tony, yes, exactly. If no word nothing,
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: no one's heard anything from nineteen year old Sarah Stern.
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: Of course, the Mama County Prosecutor's office has taken over
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: this investigation. But we're here in Belmar right now because
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: you see this behind me, the roote thirty five, a bridge,
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: that is where her car was found on Friday night.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: She's nineteen years old again. She is from Neptune, where
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: she lived with her father and her grandmother. Her father,
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: Michael Stern, actually told us by phone today that he
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: was with investigators trying to come up with anything that
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: may lead them to his daughter. She'd left home on
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: Friday night, then hours later, almost in the morning, her car.
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: According to publish reports in nineteen ninety four, Delta eighty
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: eight was found on the bridge over the Shark River Inlet.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: The New Jersey State Police Missing Persons Unit and the
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: National Center for Missing and exploited children are also assisting
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: in this investigation. A reward is now being offered in
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: this case. Of course, police are saying at this point,
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: if anyone has any information on the whereabouts of nineteen
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: year old Sarah Stern from Neptune, to please give police
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: of hall. With all of this swirling, Michael Stern, I
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: can only imagine what was running through your mind when
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: you decided to pack up and come home and drive
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: through the night starting around three am, to get from
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: Florida all the way back home. Well, it was a
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: little bit of panic set in, and I started making
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: phone calls even before I left, just try to get
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: all the couple of luggage and some things into the
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: car so I could, you know, we could get moving,
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: you know, on the road, and making phone calls to
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: try to find out if anybody knew anything else, you know,
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: where Sarah was. You know, we had already you know,
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: made a few calls and nothing. Nothing came out of
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: that except that nobody could find Sarah. She wasn't she
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: wasn't with friends, she wasn't with neighbors, she wasn't with family.
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: So it was just a kind of a panic for
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: hours during the drive How did you control that feeling
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: when you were driving? Because I remember when I had
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: just packed up the children, everything, and we had flown
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: back home to New York and got everybody in bathed,
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: in bed, and my mom called, it's about eleven o'clock
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: at night, and she said, they put your dad on
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: life support. And I remember standing in that exact spot
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: in our apartment and I said, Daddy, just hang on,
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: I'm on the way, I'm coming right now. And I
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: started I remember it sounded like a siren in my throat, screaming, okay, everybody,
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: get your clothes back on right now, get yourself packed.
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: And I started throwing everything back in the in our
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: bags we had just unpacked. And about fifteen minutes we
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: were all out at eleven fifteen at night on the
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: sidewalk trying to held a cab and I didn't know
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: how we were going to get home at that time
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: of the night, but I had to get home. And
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: the next hours were like a horrible odyssey when I
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: was far away from my dad and I couldn't get
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: to him. What was going through your mind and your
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: heart and your body, is you're driving that very very
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: hours and hours from Florida back to New Jersey. Well,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: we were all just trying to figure out, you know,
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: what happened and why the car was up there, and
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: that was that, you know, whether it was ran out
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: of gas or mechanical problems. And Sarah was just you know,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: she was hiding and didn't want anybody to find her
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: because you know, she felt that Sarah was you know,
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: she would take things to heart and she would you know,
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: feel that you know, sometimes if things were her faults,
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: she just wanted to disconnect from the world. But you know,
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: this just nothing seemed right, nothing at all seemed right.
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: From her Grandmam calling me to you know, see if
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: I could get in touch with her find out what's
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: going on. But you know, it just it was kind
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: of panic the whole time. And then like five am,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: about two hours later, we were in contact with the
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: Belmar Police, the Neptune City Police, the Coast Guard. There
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: was a lot of people involved in the search and
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: looking for to try to find out where she was.
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: And it just panic just stayed and it just didn't
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: get any better during the day because we still couldn't
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: figure things out. There was a lot of strange things, right.
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: Police then doing an alternate investigation. Take listen to police
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: bodycam audio as they enter the Sterns home. There's a
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: teenager that's supposed to be driving, it's parked on top
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: of that bridge. Or getting no answer at the house.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: I have an open door of the house. I might
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: go inside and make sure everything is kosher here. I
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: don't want to make sure we don't have a jumper.
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: Snounce yourself, really well, that's the same fors Hello, Hello,
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: that's SA Force. Police go to her house. The backdoor
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: is open and the lights are on, and there is
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: no sign of Sarah. Hello, where is Sarah? Stung Nancy
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: Grace signing off good bye to me,