Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / FIND Aubrey: Parents of Lehigh Valley girl, 14, FEAR Daughter SEX TRAFFICKED

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FIND Aubrey: Parents of Lehigh Valley girl, 14, FEAR Daughter SEX TRAFFICKED · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:00
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, please help us find Aubrey.
0:09
Speaker 1: The parents of a missing Lehigh Valley girl are pleading
0:12
Speaker 1: for your help Tonight. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories.
0:16
Speaker 1: Thank you for being with US police desperately searching for
0:21
Speaker 1: a missing fourteen year old amidst a family's fears of
0:24
Speaker 1: sex trafficking. Joining us an all star panel to make
0:28
Speaker 1: sense of what we are learning about missing Aubrey Tonight
0:33
Speaker 1: as the days pass her parents are desperate and they
0:36
Speaker 1: are joining us now straight out to John German, joining us,
0:40
Speaker 1: her stepdad.
0:41
Speaker 2: And her mom Jade. To both of you, thank you
0:44
Speaker 2: for being with us. John. From what you have told me, there.
0:48
Speaker 1: Was no indication at all that Aubrey would just run
0:54
Speaker 1: away and disappear. Why are you concerned Aubrey could be
1:00
Speaker 1: sex trafficked?
1:01
Speaker 3: Thank you, Nancy.
1:03
Speaker 4: Our concerns are there stem from the fact that we
1:07
Speaker 4: learned that there was extensive use of a hotspot in
1:11
Speaker 4: our home from a real phone that we provided her
1:15
Speaker 4: that had multiple layers of parental controls. Saturday morning, one
1:21
Speaker 4: of Aubrey's closest friend, if not her closest friend, provided
1:25
Speaker 4: us feedback that she had tried to reach out to Aubrey.
1:30
Speaker 4: I said to her, well, I have Aubrey's phone and
1:33
Speaker 4: I don't see an inbound call or a text, and
1:36
Speaker 4: the young girl uttered the phrase to us, that is
1:41
Speaker 4: the beginning of our living nightmare here, which is I
1:44
Speaker 4: contacted your daughter through her secret snapcat.
1:48
Speaker 5: And she proceeded to Okay, whoa, whoa wait, wait, guys
1:52
Speaker 5: with me, Aubrey's mom and stepdad, Jade and John, you
1:58
Speaker 5: just fell want you put a dagger in my heart
2:03
Speaker 5: secret snap Chat hold on just a moment.
2:08
Speaker 1: Joining me is a special guest, an a sonoda, a
2:12
Speaker 1: grooming expert. Snapchat can be innocent, but it can also
2:18
Speaker 1: be every parent's worst a nightmare and a nutshell, because remember, Anna,
2:24
Speaker 1: you're very well versed in all of this, a digital
2:28
Speaker 1: the digital scare parents live through.
2:30
Speaker 2: In a nutshell? What is Snapchat? What is he talking about?
2:34
Speaker 4: Nancy?
2:34
Speaker 6: Snapchat is one of the most popular apps that teens
2:37
Speaker 6: are using these days to not only share messages, but
2:41
Speaker 6: also share pictures and videos. The unique part about Snapchat
2:45
Speaker 6: is that whatever you send, you get it and.
2:49
Speaker 2: Then it disappears.
2:50
Speaker 6: However, we all know that it still lives on in
2:53
Speaker 6: the cloud on the web itself. But this is an
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Speaker 6: app that is used by most teenagers can through smart devices,
3:01
Speaker 6: and it is a playground for potential predators.
3:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know it can be innocent too, Anna, because
3:09
Speaker 1: the other day the twins send out a snapchat to
3:13
Speaker 1: a group about homecoming get together and it can be
3:17
Speaker 1: useful and wonderful.
3:19
Speaker 2: And they keep in touch that way. But you're right.
3:22
Speaker 1: It disappears virtually as soon as you send it, and
3:25
Speaker 1: it's among other media platforms, is very popular.
3:32
Speaker 2: If anybody says email, just wipe that out of your mind.
3:37
Speaker 1: Tweens, preteens scenes, that's a thing of the past. Don't
3:42
Speaker 1: even say FB, Facebook.
3:44
Speaker 2: Forget it, not happening. They don't care. It's over for them.
3:50
Speaker 2: Maybe you and your friends all do Facebook. They don't.
3:54
Speaker 2: Back to John.
3:55
Speaker 1: German and Jade, the mom and stepfather of this little girl.
4:00
Speaker 2: To Jade, this is Aubrey's mom, Jade.
4:05
Speaker 7: What went through your mind when you realized Aubrey was
4:09
Speaker 7: not in her room's parents' worst nightmare because just the
4:15
Speaker 7: week that she left, she was good morning, good.
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Speaker 3: Night, love you mom, love you Dad. And discover her
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Speaker 3: disappearance and knowing the next day of the snapchat, we
4:30
Speaker 3: know it's very bad news, and the nightmare begins.
4:33
Speaker 1: What were you telling you at the hotspot? And snapchat
4:36
Speaker 1: what you learned? Because as Jade, mom is telling us
4:41
Speaker 1: right before she disappears, I.
4:43
Speaker 2: Love you, Mom, I love you guys and goes to bed.
4:47
Speaker 4: That's Aubrey most nights. Actually we have to fight her off.
4:54
Speaker 4: She's going to bed. She says good night, I love
4:57
Speaker 4: you over and over. It's very endearing of her. She
5:01
Speaker 4: is a very loving and kind young girl, and she
5:06
Speaker 4: wants to hear it back. She doesn't want us to
5:09
Speaker 4: nod and just go uh huh okay. Sometimes I could
5:13
Speaker 4: be a little bit like that and Aubrey would just
5:15
Speaker 4: come over, give her mom a big hug, give me
5:18
Speaker 4: a hug, and say, all right, guys, I'm going to bed,
5:21
Speaker 4: And yeah, I agree with Jade. We were very blind sided.
5:25
Speaker 4: But I know your question is about the hotspot. So
5:28
Speaker 4: the night before we did have an opportunity to take Aubrey.
5:32
Speaker 4: She had dance plass that evening, so we took her
5:35
Speaker 4: out to eat our favorite spot. You'd like to go
5:38
Speaker 4: to a popeyees. We get some chicken, We sit in
5:40
Speaker 4: the parking lot, listen to some music and that that's
5:43
Speaker 4: our space, and we began to talk, and the conversation
5:47
Speaker 4: was a little difficult, a little bit more difficult than
5:50
Speaker 4: usual get into the to the truth of what some
5:53
Speaker 4: of the things were we were talking about. So we
5:55
Speaker 4: asked for Aubrey's cell phone, and right away some things
6:00
Speaker 4: looked off. There was no recent phone calls for the
6:03
Speaker 4: prior month, there was no recent text messages for the
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Speaker 4: prior month. And to know Aubrey is to know Aubrey
6:09
Speaker 4: is a social butterfly. There ever, was one and all
6:13
Speaker 4: winter break she had been going out to the mall,
6:16
Speaker 4: to the library, so we were a little concerned that
6:19
Speaker 4: we saw like the lack of coordination on her phone.
6:24
Speaker 4: So as Jade and her are talking, I grabbed my phone,
6:28
Speaker 4: which gives me the billing details, and actually, surprisingly the
6:32
Speaker 4: calls and the text they match up, so I'm actually thinking, Okay,
6:36
Speaker 4: this is good. And then I noticed there's a third
6:39
Speaker 4: tab on my bill that I've never seen before, which
6:42
Speaker 4: is hotspot. Now, in our own home, we have Wi Fi.
6:47
Speaker 4: Jade and I both work remotely from home, so I
6:50
Speaker 4: was a little surprised to see that there was a
6:52
Speaker 4: hotspot being used on the account. So I went into
6:56
Speaker 4: the details, and when I clicked on the details, and
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Speaker 4: now this is January ninth, my ninth day on a
7:00
Speaker 4: thirty day billion cycle, a twenty three page result is
7:04
Speaker 4: returned to me. So immediately I turned to Jade in
7:08
Speaker 4: the front seat of the car and I said, Jade,
7:09
Speaker 4: we've got a major problem, kind of you know, just
7:11
Speaker 4: kind of whispering between parents here. I turned to Aubrey
7:15
Speaker 4: and I handed to my phone and I said, I'd
7:16
Speaker 4: like you to help us understand why there's twenty one
7:19
Speaker 4: pages of hotspot activity, and let's start with what the
7:23
Speaker 4: device is, just trying to cut right to the case.
7:27
Speaker 4: But Nancy, unfortunately that conversation we didn't get to the
7:33
Speaker 4: end state of any acknowledgment that there was even a
7:37
Speaker 4: device in our house. It was a challenging conversation for us,
7:41
Speaker 4: and we've had many of these.
7:42
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, do you know how much I hate
7:46
Speaker 1: confronting the twins over being on the phone too much.
7:50
Speaker 1: I have to practically wrestle it away from my son.
7:54
Speaker 2: They're both seventeen.
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Speaker 1: They're twins at the dinner table, which is a major
7:59
Speaker 1: no no. And you'll say, Mom, I'm just filling the
8:02
Speaker 1: blank and it always seems so legit. I'm checking what
8:05
Speaker 1: time the game is, I'm this, I'm that, but it's
8:08
Speaker 1: there attached to it. I actually think it's some psychological thing,
8:12
Speaker 1: and I'm going to go to our shrink in just
8:13
Speaker 1: a moment. But this is what we learned about the
8:18
Speaker 1: additional tab.
8:20
Speaker 2: Listen.
8:21
Speaker 8: Just over six months after Aubrey gets her own phone,
8:24
Speaker 8: her parents discover a second, older iPhone hidden in her room.
8:28
Speaker 8: When confronted, Aubrey admits she convinced a boy at school
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Speaker 8: to give it to her, and he told his parents.
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Speaker 9: He lost it.
8:34
Speaker 8: Aubrey's extremely upset when her parents take both phones away
8:37
Speaker 8: and ground her after.
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Speaker 10: School, Aubrey only comes out for a quiet dinner, then
8:41
Speaker 10: goes straight back upstairs. Aubrey's parents tuck in for an
8:45
Speaker 10: early night, assuming Aubrey has done the scene behind her
8:48
Speaker 10: closed bedroom door.
8:49
Speaker 1: As I mentioned earlier, we have an all star panel
8:53
Speaker 1: joining with Aubrey's parents, trying our best to help bring
8:57
Speaker 1: this fourteen year old little girl home her parents, and
9:01
Speaker 1: you'll learn why fear that she has been sex trafficked.
9:06
Speaker 1: In Joining me right now, a long time colleague that
9:10
Speaker 1: I now consider a friend, Alicia Kozykevitch. She goes by
9:16
Speaker 1: Alicia Kozak and she is the survivor.
9:21
Speaker 2: Of a teen abduction. She was lured via the Internet.
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Speaker 1: She was held hostage, abused, beaten, and it was the
9:37
Speaker 1: evening her kidnapper had planned to kill her after sharing
9:44
Speaker 1: images of her to other pedophiles. One of the pedophiles
9:51
Speaker 1: felt sorry for her and called police. That is how
9:56
Speaker 1: her life was saved within hours of her death. Her
10:02
Speaker 1: being with us is a miracle, and tonight we have
10:05
Speaker 1: a chance to save another young girl. Aubrey, Alicia, I
10:14
Speaker 1: don't know how you managed to tell your story over
10:19
Speaker 1: and over, bringing up the worst thing that has ever
10:22
Speaker 1: happened to you.
10:25
Speaker 2: How were you as a little girl lord online?
10:30
Speaker 11: Yes, Nancy, I am so lucky to be here. And
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Speaker 11: it's a really hard story to share that I've been
10:35
Speaker 11: sharing since I was fourteen years old, and it is
10:38
Speaker 11: such an important story to share because it's what so
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Speaker 11: many kids are facing today. When I was thirteen, I
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Speaker 11: was really shy. I was quiet. I was the good kid.
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Speaker 11: I was curious. I was just a kid. But I
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Speaker 11: was vulnerable, as all kids are, and predators are seeking
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Speaker 11: out kids who are vulnerable, which Unfortunately, all kids are vulnerable,
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Speaker 11: and so what they do is they look for those
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Speaker 11: vulnerabilities to exploit and they groom and act as though
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Speaker 11: they are a friend. And it's really so simple. It's
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Speaker 11: just being into what the child is into, saying what
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Speaker 11: the child wants to hear, versus what they need to hear.
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Speaker 11: Always being there for them, always on their side, always
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Speaker 11: somebody that they can count on, somebody who makes them laugh,
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Speaker 11: somebody who makes them feel connected, and somebody who feels
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Speaker 11: like they know the real them. We have so many
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Speaker 11: different versions of ourselves, especially as kids. We have the
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Speaker 11: US at school, with US at the dinner table, the
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Speaker 11: US at church, the US here, the S there, But
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Speaker 11: who is the real you? And kids are still trying
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Speaker 11: to figure out certainly who they are. They're trying to
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Speaker 11: figure out what they like, literally their identity, and predators
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Speaker 11: come in, swoop in and say, well, I know the
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Speaker 11: real you, and I think the real you is amazing.
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Speaker 11: While they're trying to discover all this slowly breaks down boundaries,
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Speaker 11: and they are so good at doing what they do.
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Speaker 2: It's amazing to me.
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Speaker 1: Alicia Koseykevich that you were very loved by your family.
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Speaker 2: You loved them back.
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Speaker 1: But you met a friend online that first posed as
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Speaker 1: a girl and later said, hey, I'm really a boy.
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Speaker 1: But you know, I was just trying to get close
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Speaker 1: to you. And I don't think you talked to me
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Speaker 1: if you I was.
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Speaker 2: A boy, blah blah blah.
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Speaker 1: And so you overlooked that adults wouldn't do that children would.
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Speaker 1: And then one night around Christmas time, you're sitting at
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Speaker 1: the table having dinner.
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Speaker 2: It starts very lightly.
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Speaker 1: Snowing outside, and your friend says, come meet me outside,
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Speaker 1: and between dinner and dessert, you vanish.
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Speaker 6: Yeah.
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Speaker 11: And that's something that I talked to children about, definitely
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Speaker 11: and to adults, is that I felt so loved. I
12:57
Speaker 11: knew I was loved. I had such a close relationship
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Speaker 11: my family, and yet deep down I still felt lonely,
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Speaker 11: and that loneliness was one of my big vulnerabilities. And
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Speaker 11: on New Year's Day two thousand and two, I agreed
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Speaker 11: to meet this person, which was completely out of my character.
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Speaker 11: Like I said, I was really shy, I was really quiet.
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Speaker 11: I was a kid who didn't raise their hand in class.
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Speaker 11: I wasn't the kid who would go to walk to
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Speaker 11: the grocery store. I was a very quiet at home
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Speaker 11: kind of kid. And what predators do is they are
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Speaker 11: able to wear down who which child is in so
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Speaker 11: many ways and to change who they are characteristically and
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Speaker 11: get them to do things that they would never do.
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Speaker 11: If you had talked to me the night before this
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Speaker 11: happened and said, hey, Alicia, this is what you're going
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Speaker 11: to do in the future, I would say absolutely not.
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Speaker 11: I would never do that. I'm so much smarter than that,
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Speaker 11: I'm so much more careful than that. And yet on
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Speaker 11: that night, against every bit of who I am, I
13:54
Speaker 11: went against that because that's how good predators are at
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Speaker 11: what they do.
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Speaker 1: Alicia, with a ten minutes of leaving the supper table,
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Speaker 1: where did you find yourself?
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Speaker 11: I found myself in this man's car and he began
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Speaker 11: driving from Pittsyl, Pennsylvania, where I lived, to Virginia, where
14:16
Speaker 11: he held me captive in his basement.
14:18
Speaker 8: Dungeon, A Pennsylvania family is worried sick about fourteen year
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Speaker 8: old inc Aubrey WU, who disappeared six weeks ago. Aubrey's
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Speaker 8: parents say, based on her secret social media use, Aubrey
14:30
Speaker 8: could be anywhere from California to Saudi Arabia. Her parents
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Speaker 8: terrified she was lured out of their home by a
14:36
Speaker 8: predator and may be a victim of sex trafficking. Pennsylvania
14:40
Speaker 8: teen in c Aubrey wu critically missing as a search
14:44
Speaker 8: intensifies after the fourteen year old girl was last seen
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Speaker 8: at home over six weeks ago.
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Speaker 1: We may have a chance to bring Aubrey home alive.
14:55
Speaker 2: Look at her. Here is the number to call if
14:58
Speaker 2: you think even think you have seen her.
15:02
Speaker 1: Six one zero seven five nine to two hundred repeat
15:07
Speaker 1: six one zero seven five nine two to zero. Crime
15:19
Speaker 1: Stories with Nancy Grace. Her parents joining us tonight. Now,
15:27
Speaker 1: the dad and mom just told you that they took
15:32
Speaker 1: her phone away when they realized she had a secret phone,
15:38
Speaker 1: and then she didn't like it.
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Speaker 2: Of course, and then this.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, it's our ruler.
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Speaker 12: Is he here?
15:50
Speaker 4: She should be hold on, hold.
15:52
Speaker 3: On or Mom and I are hitting that.
15:53
Speaker 4: I'm wait all right, hold on, hey.
16:00
Speaker 2: Aubrey.
16:02
Speaker 13: Aubrey.
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Speaker 14: John German calls upstairs for Aubrey several times, but receives
16:07
Speaker 14: no answer. The family security cameras reveal Aubrey crawled out
16:11
Speaker 14: her bedroom window.
16:12
Speaker 1: Oh my stars, straight back out to the parents, joining us, Mom, Jay, Stepdad, John,
16:20
Speaker 1: what did you guys think, Quen, you go to the
16:24
Speaker 1: door and it's police. John, What were police doing at
16:28
Speaker 1: your door? And we see you steal in your bathrobe?
16:32
Speaker 1: Start calling Ay Aubrey, come down. What did they tell you?
16:36
Speaker 1: Why were they looking for your girl?
16:39
Speaker 4: Well, thanks for the question, Nancy. You know that video
16:43
Speaker 4: shows me at the front door. But actually what woke
16:46
Speaker 4: us up because we do take a nap and use
16:48
Speaker 4: a sound machine. They were banging on our bedroom windows
16:51
Speaker 4: on the side of our house. They were banging on
16:53
Speaker 4: our back door. So actually I first checked the back door,
16:56
Speaker 4: thinking maybe it was just some kids in the neighborhood,
16:59
Speaker 4: you know, kind of goofing around, and that's why I
17:01
Speaker 4: have my bathrobe on. I go to the door, but
17:03
Speaker 4: when I look through the blinds, I see police lights
17:07
Speaker 4: light lit up all around our property. It was about
17:09
Speaker 4: five cards out there. And then as soon as I
17:12
Speaker 4: hollered up to her that actually I wasn't so worried. Honestly,
17:16
Speaker 4: Nancy Aubrey has a tendency to be in her room
17:19
Speaker 4: with headphones on listening to music. It is Friday night,
17:23
Speaker 4: so I just thought maybe she didn't hear me, And
17:27
Speaker 4: then I asked Jade to go upstairs and check. But
17:30
Speaker 4: when Jade said she's not there, that is a feeling
17:34
Speaker 4: that I don't ever want to feel again, and I
17:36
Speaker 4: don't want any other parent to have to feel it
17:39
Speaker 4: was It brings me to tears out even to talk
17:42
Speaker 4: about it. It's just in this moment when we know
17:46
Speaker 4: she's not there, and that window, Nancy, it is configured
17:49
Speaker 4: to only open as much for a window fan, so
17:53
Speaker 4: it's maybe only eight inches of an opening, so and
17:57
Speaker 4: it goes out onto a rickety old roof and probably
18:00
Speaker 4: hasn't had a new shingle at it since nineteen thirty
18:03
Speaker 4: when it was built, so it's very dangerous. It's not
18:06
Speaker 4: even just you know, like she's got to go onto
18:08
Speaker 4: one roof, then she's got to climb or jump onto
18:11
Speaker 4: the adjoining roof and then climb over this tiny balcony
18:16
Speaker 4: where our neighbor keeps a big grill.
18:19
Speaker 2: And it's a lot.
18:20
Speaker 4: I was actually quite stunned, I at first, until we
18:23
Speaker 4: got our neighbor's camera. Jade and I were actually completely
18:29
Speaker 4: puzzled as to how she left the house and we
18:31
Speaker 4: didn't see it on our cameras because I kept telling
18:34
Speaker 4: Jade that opening is just small and then we saw
18:37
Speaker 4: the footage, so she really you know, I would have
18:41
Speaker 4: had a difficult time getting out of that window, that's
18:43
Speaker 4: for sure, and it was really unsafe.
18:46
Speaker 1: Joining me now is Karen Start, renownced psychologist, TV radio
18:50
Speaker 1: trauma expert. You can find her at Karenstart dot com.
18:54
Speaker 1: Joining us from Manhattan today, Karen, thank you for being
18:56
Speaker 1: with us. I'm going to circle back in a moment
18:59
Speaker 1: to Annison who wrote duck Groom. But Karen, I get
19:03
Speaker 1: the sense to that a cell phone, And here we
19:06
Speaker 1: see the parents gave her a cell phone just before
19:10
Speaker 1: her birthday, but before that she had convinced a little
19:15
Speaker 1: boy at school to give her his cell phone okay,
19:19
Speaker 1: and tell his mom he lost it. Smart girl, And
19:22
Speaker 1: she created I guess a hotspot to use that phone
19:27
Speaker 1: right because it didn't have internet service, so she arranged
19:30
Speaker 1: for there to be internet service. So when dad is
19:33
Speaker 1: looking at her phone and comparing it to his bill
19:36
Speaker 1: and seeing big chunks of time, she's not using her
19:40
Speaker 1: cell when she goes to the mall or wherever she goes,
19:42
Speaker 1: she's not texting anything. It's because she's on this secret phone.
19:46
Speaker 1: And what I'm getting at with you is I swear.
19:49
Speaker 1: Sometimes I feel that cell phones, the internet TikTok. Adults
19:56
Speaker 1: do it too. My best friend from law school, every
19:58
Speaker 1: time I look at him, he's looking at it. I'm like, Frank,
20:01
Speaker 1: get off your phone. You're with actual people right now.
20:04
Speaker 1: It's an addiction like drinking. Are drugs, Karen.
20:08
Speaker 12: Without a doubt, Nancy phones anything with social media that's
20:13
Speaker 12: taken over our culture. That's how everybody who is young
20:17
Speaker 12: interacts with each other. And here we're talking about a
20:20
Speaker 12: really smart little girl who understood how to get around rules,
20:25
Speaker 12: who was rebellious. Maybe she felt that the constraints were
20:29
Speaker 12: too tight on her. None if this is unusual for
20:32
Speaker 12: a teenager, but keep in mind that their brains are
20:35
Speaker 12: not fully developed. They really don't understand things in a
20:39
Speaker 12: complex way. It's black or white. So here she is,
20:43
Speaker 12: and she is manipulating the system and believing that what
20:48
Speaker 12: she's doing is okay. That she doesn't understand negative consequences.
20:53
Speaker 12: You just don't. That's why it's so hard to get
20:56
Speaker 12: to teenagers.
20:57
Speaker 4: You have to be able to talk of your level.
21:00
Speaker 12: How that bone ship take it over and everyone is
21:03
Speaker 12: constantly looking at them. That's the whole culture when it
21:08
Speaker 12: comes to your children and everyone's children.
21:11
Speaker 1: You know, Anna Sna She's right, Anna, this is what
21:15
Speaker 1: I've learned.
21:17
Speaker 2: There's no spanking, no hitting, no go to your room
21:22
Speaker 2: at our home.
21:23
Speaker 1: If we want to make a point, which is I've
21:28
Speaker 1: got to say, let me knock on what israere? Because
21:30
Speaker 1: the twins are super well, they're practically perfect. I'll just
21:34
Speaker 1: put it that way. But that's also that's what these
21:38
Speaker 1: parents thought too. They had never had trouble with her.
21:41
Speaker 1: She's great, grades, sweet, loving, the works. But if you
21:46
Speaker 1: take their phone, it's like you've poured acid on them.
21:51
Speaker 2: I think it's some sort of an addiction.
21:53
Speaker 1: And the way that she behaved, the way she reacted
21:59
Speaker 1: when the parents took her phone, is entirely normal. She
22:04
Speaker 1: was angry, she went to her room, she came out
22:07
Speaker 1: that evening, she had a very quiet dinner, went back
22:10
Speaker 1: to her room, and the next morning the cops were
22:13
Speaker 1: at the door when the little friend can't find her.
22:16
Speaker 6: Yeah, and Nancy, everything you're highlighting here indicates that this
22:21
Speaker 6: is a normal teenage girl, and normal teenage girls have struggles.
22:25
Speaker 6: They have challenges, whether in their homes or at school,
22:29
Speaker 6: with friends, and just with their own identities. As they're
22:33
Speaker 6: going through adolescents. So it's not uncommon to see that
22:38
Speaker 6: teens will turn to the Internet and apps and people
22:42
Speaker 6: that they meet online for support, for validation. And unfortunately,
22:49
Speaker 6: predators are well positioned to arm themselves in a position
22:54
Speaker 6: of availability in the space that's available to them. Even still,
23:01
Speaker 6: parents look and think, oh, well, my child's at home.
23:03
Speaker 6: They are safe because they're not outside, But all the
23:07
Speaker 6: while they're accessing the Internet from the comfort of their
23:10
Speaker 6: bedrooms or their their homes themselves. And this is a
23:14
Speaker 6: risk factor that all families need to be aware of,
23:18
Speaker 6: just like this family was aware of it. That's why
23:20
Speaker 6: they have parenting controls. And unfortunately, no, no level of
23:24
Speaker 6: monitoring is enough when predators know exactly how to infiltrate
23:30
Speaker 6: the minds and spirits of our young people.
23:35
Speaker 4: And I don't think yeah here, yeah, an order here,
23:40
Speaker 4: she should be hold on, hold on our mom, and
23:43
Speaker 4: I are thinking that I'm all right, hold on.
23:49
Speaker 13: Hey, Aubrey, Aubrey, You're.
23:56
Speaker 6: All has been forwarded to your voicemail. The person you're
23:59
Speaker 6: trying to reach is not Ail at hells.
24:02
Speaker 3: Recording your message had finished.
24:04
Speaker 4: Recording, then I am astoring you as.
24:09
Speaker 15: A as you have my fourteen year old stepdaughter in
24:13
Speaker 15: your custody.
24:15
Speaker 1: There you hear Aubrey's parents begging an older white female
24:23
Speaker 1: to get in touch with them about Aubrey. Now, how
24:26
Speaker 1: does she play into this scenario? Straight out to crimeonline
24:30
Speaker 1: dot Com investigative reporter Sydney Sumner and a nutshell.
24:34
Speaker 2: Who is this woman?
24:35
Speaker 16: Sydney Fancy? So we believe this woman just happened across Aubrey.
24:40
Speaker 16: So Aubrey has left her home, it's dark, it's cold outside.
24:44
Speaker 16: This woman just happens to spot her as he if
24:47
Speaker 16: she's okay, and Aubrey tells the story of having left
24:54
Speaker 16: her abusive home and needing someplace to stay. So this
24:59
Speaker 16: woman is acting with good intentions, maybe not the best intentions,
25:05
Speaker 16: but she takes this young girl into her home thinking
25:09
Speaker 16: she needs help.
25:10
Speaker 2: Listen.
25:10
Speaker 10: About half an hour after the woman says Aubrey left,
25:14
Speaker 10: another woman sponts Aubrey hitchhiking near the Ormrod Quarry. Fifteen
25:18
Speaker 10: minutes later, Aubrey appears again, this time on surveillance at
25:22
Speaker 10: a wah Wah convenience store. Aubrey is still wearing her
25:25
Speaker 10: blue sweater with red sleeves, black yoga pants and her
25:29
Speaker 10: white Billie Eilish sneakers, but she also has a gray
25:32
Speaker 10: beanie and a bag. She did not leave her home
25:34
Speaker 10: with Aubrey appears to be alone.
25:36
Speaker 1: Straight out to Aubrey's mom, Jade Wu, there's no doubt
25:40
Speaker 1: in my mind that that is a photo of Aubrey.
25:44
Speaker 3: Yes, that's right now.
25:45
Speaker 2: When was that photo taken? As it relates to when
25:48
Speaker 2: she left the home through the window.
25:49
Speaker 17: This picture was taken by a Wahwah convenience store at
25:55
Speaker 17: January elevens, one day after Aubrey left home nine pm
26:01
Speaker 17: at Whitehall, which is thirty minutes away from our home
26:06
Speaker 17: in Palmer Township.
26:07
Speaker 2: So we know she was alive the next day. So
26:12
Speaker 2: who is this woman and what does she, if anything,
26:16
Speaker 2: have to do with Aubrey. Listen.
26:18
Speaker 14: Using the phone number Aubrey contacted her boyfriend from Palmer,
26:21
Speaker 14: PD tracked down the woman Aubrey is believed to be with.
26:25
Speaker 14: The older woman lives in a wealthy area of Allentown,
26:28
Speaker 14: more than twenty miles from Aubrey's home. The woman recognizes
26:31
Speaker 14: Aubrey's picture and admits the teen was with her but
26:35
Speaker 14: ran away just a few minutes ago. The woman claims
26:38
Speaker 14: she crossed paths with Aubrey on the street around nine
26:41
Speaker 14: pm Friday night and invited the teen into her home
26:44
Speaker 14: as she was not dressed for the weather.
26:46
Speaker 1: All of this because her parents take away her cell phone.
26:52
Speaker 1: Joining me now, expert the director of Operations USP, a
26:57
Speaker 1: nationwide security who leads a team of investigators who specialize
27:02
Speaker 1: in finding missing people. With me is Brian Fitzgibbons at
27:07
Speaker 1: uspasecurity dot Com. Brian, at the beginning, I was highly
27:14
Speaker 1: suspicious of this woman. Okay, a middle Asia, older woman
27:18
Speaker 1: living in some wealthy enclave sees Aubrey. Aubrey gives her
27:25
Speaker 1: a hard luck story. The woman takes her home, believes
27:29
Speaker 1: the story, and before the woman can contact the parents
27:34
Speaker 1: or anyone else, Aubrey runs away.
27:38
Speaker 2: Now what do we do, Brian? Exactly? We're talking about
27:42
Speaker 2: out of the frying pan and into the fire here.
27:46
Speaker 13: What likely the next step needs to be is to
27:49
Speaker 13: look at forensically, look at this woman's cell phone, see
27:53
Speaker 13: what apps were downloaded, what was logged into.
27:56
Speaker 2: We have to believe that Aubrey.
27:58
Speaker 13: Used her phone to communich kate in multiple ways with
28:02
Speaker 13: multiple people, and that's that's the next hard lead in this.
28:05
Speaker 1: Case, Alicia Kozakevitch joining us. I want you to hear this, Alicia.
28:10
Speaker 15: This woman, though, believes that we are physical using Aubrey
28:13
Speaker 15: and is preparing to turn her over to people from
28:17
Speaker 15: Pennsylvania to get her out of here. This woman, they said,
28:21
Speaker 15: she seems.
28:21
Speaker 3: A nice older woman.
28:23
Speaker 15: That woman is convinced that we needed the torture awry,
28:26
Speaker 15: and she thinks she.
28:27
Speaker 3: Is helping all.
28:28
Speaker 4: This kid is connecting the pots of talking.
28:30
Speaker 15: Up her friends, realizing she ran away and that she's
28:34
Speaker 15: beenigulating this oldly.
28:35
Speaker 3: But the old lady keeps hanging.
28:37
Speaker 17: Out on me.
28:37
Speaker 3: She wanted to answer my.
28:40
Speaker 1: Alisha Kozykevitch was lured as a little girl about the
28:44
Speaker 1: same age as Aubrey, lured online by a predator. She
28:49
Speaker 1: was horribly abused and beaten, kept in an underground dungeon.
28:56
Speaker 2: But she actually lied to her family. But think about it.
29:03
Speaker 1: A child that doesn't tell mom and dad, hey, I
29:06
Speaker 1: made a new friend online.
29:10
Speaker 2: Is that lying? Well, of course it is to us,
29:12
Speaker 2: but the child is innocent and doesn't understand.
29:16
Speaker 1: So, Alicia, are you surprised at all that Aubrey told
29:21
Speaker 1: this old lady, hey, hey, I've got to get away from.
29:24
Speaker 2: Home and spend the night there. I'm not surprised at all.
29:27
Speaker 11: No, it's not surprising, especially because to Aubrey it may
29:31
Speaker 11: have been that something in her sphere of things was
29:35
Speaker 11: happening at home that to her it did feel like abuse.
29:38
Speaker 11: To her, it did feel like that. And kids are
29:41
Speaker 11: going through so so much and they want help, and
29:45
Speaker 11: often we tell them go to a trusted adult, but
29:48
Speaker 11: it's who they trust as an adult, not necessarily an
29:52
Speaker 11: adult that they can trust. And that may very well
29:55
Speaker 11: be what happened here. And that if this woman was
29:58
Speaker 11: acting with the best intentions, which maybe she was, possibly
30:02
Speaker 11: possibly she wasn't that she didn't take the best actions.
30:06
Speaker 11: She did need to call the police immediately, she did
30:09
Speaker 11: need to go to the hospital. As he had said,
30:11
Speaker 11: there needed to be an action taken immediately, and not
30:14
Speaker 11: that this young girl needed to be hidden away. That's
30:17
Speaker 11: where everything fell apart. And now this girl is lost
30:21
Speaker 11: when we were able to tell.
30:23
Speaker 1: Where she was prior to this, and here is another
30:27
Speaker 1: chance that she could have been saved. Aubrey convinces the
30:33
Speaker 1: old woman to take her to her little boyfriend's family.
30:38
Speaker 2: Listen, Yah, this.
30:40
Speaker 18: Person partlandand Aubrey's boyfriend reaches out to her parents to
30:51
Speaker 18: tell them about the encounter with Aubrey and the woman
30:54
Speaker 18: outside his home.
30:55
Speaker 10: He says Aubrey appeared physically okay and describes the woman
30:59
Speaker 10: she was with as an older white woman driving an SUV,
31:02
Speaker 10: but he can't speak to the make or model of
31:05
Speaker 10: the car. He sends them screenshots of several texts from Aubrey,
31:09
Speaker 10: but says she isn't answering him anymore.
31:17
Speaker 2: Crime stories with Nancy.
31:19
Speaker 1: Grace straight back out to Jay, this is Aubrey's mom,
31:25
Speaker 1: so here's another chance. The old lady could have saved Aubrey,
31:31
Speaker 1: but she believed Aubrey. She believed what Aubrey said in
31:35
Speaker 1: her attempt to run away. Then Aubrey convinces the older
31:40
Speaker 1: woman to take her to her little boyfriends. They get
31:44
Speaker 1: there and the boyfriend's mom will not let her stay,
31:48
Speaker 1: so she takes off. There was another chance to save
31:53
Speaker 1: her right there.
31:55
Speaker 17: Jade, Yes, when I hear about Aubrey's have met conn
32:00
Speaker 17: that was this boyfriend and it happens to me. I
32:02
Speaker 17: was luckily on Aubrey's Snapchat account and boyfriend was try
32:08
Speaker 17: to apologize to Aubrey, say that I wish I could
32:12
Speaker 17: have help you, And I immediately told him that I'm
32:16
Speaker 17: her mom and she's been missing, and please tell me
32:20
Speaker 17: what happened.
32:21
Speaker 3: So he told me that half hour ago, this woman
32:25
Speaker 3: with the suv come to their front door. It's not
32:30
Speaker 3: exactly at their front door. They meet them at a
32:33
Speaker 3: corner of their place. And this woman, like both boyfriend's
32:41
Speaker 3: mom and this old woman, refused to call the police
32:45
Speaker 3: and refuse to save my little throat And how entitled
32:50
Speaker 3: are they to take it on their hands? The old
32:53
Speaker 3: women say it to the mother of the boyfriend. If
32:58
Speaker 3: you're going to take her, I'm no way to tend
33:01
Speaker 3: it to police. I'm going to tear her out of
33:04
Speaker 3: state tomorrow.
33:06
Speaker 4: When this boy messages to Aubrey saying, I'm so sorry
33:11
Speaker 4: that my parents did that to you and they weren't
33:13
Speaker 4: able to help you. I hope, I hope you're going
33:17
Speaker 4: to be okay. They do not have a relationship, as
33:21
Speaker 4: he has depicted to his parents that necessity necessitated them
33:26
Speaker 4: calling in a welfare check to begin with.
33:28
Speaker 1: The trail for their daughter, just fourteen years old, goes dead.
33:33
Speaker 1: When she leaves the little boyfriend's family standing outside. They
33:38
Speaker 1: say you can't stay here and send her off. Now
33:42
Speaker 1: they are convinced their daughter has been sex trafficked, and.
33:47
Speaker 10: This is why since Aubrey's disappearance, her parents have dug
33:50
Speaker 10: through her social media profiles, discovering Aubrey has thousands of
33:54
Speaker 10: contacts on Snapchat from all around the world, and many
33:58
Speaker 10: of her conversations are much older than her. Her dangerous
34:02
Speaker 10: social media behavior has her parents terrified that Aubrey could
34:06
Speaker 10: have plans to meet up with the predator and that
34:08
Speaker 10: Aubrey could end up anywhere.
34:11
Speaker 19: A family's worst nightmare becomes a reality after their fourteen
34:15
Speaker 19: year old daughter in c Aubrey Wuh goes missing amidst
34:18
Speaker 19: fears the young girl may have fallen prey to online predators.
34:23
Speaker 1: Joining us tonight, Aubrey's mother Jay and stepfather John joining us.
34:29
Speaker 1: But now to the family attorney, Alexandria Ali Crothammel, thank
34:35
Speaker 1: you so much for being with us and for what
34:37
Speaker 1: you were doing for her family. Let me understand what
34:41
Speaker 1: exactly was the last siding of Aubrey.
34:45
Speaker 2: Ali for the.
34:46
Speaker 20: Last sighting of Aubrey was that she was seen at
34:49
Speaker 20: the South Whitehall wall walk. There is video surveillance of
34:53
Speaker 20: that and then she was subsequently seen by a person
34:58
Speaker 20: at the Panera Bread, which is about a five minute
35:01
Speaker 20: to ten minute walk from the wah Wah in the
35:05
Speaker 20: same town, which is South Whitehall, Pennsylvania.
35:07
Speaker 1: I'm curious, Allie, this is Allie Crothwell speaking the family lawyer. Allie,
35:13
Speaker 1: what time of the day or night were these sidings
35:17
Speaker 1: at the wah Wahs which is like a convenience store
35:20
Speaker 1: grocery store and the Panera Bread.
35:22
Speaker 21: It was approximately nine pm because we know this because
35:29
Speaker 21: the man that spoke to Aubrey at the Panera Bread
35:33
Speaker 21: was picking up his child from the Panera and they
35:36
Speaker 21: closed at approximately nine pm.
35:38
Speaker 1: Guys, we have a confirmed siding of her at the
35:42
Speaker 1: Panera Bread.
35:44
Speaker 2: After that, there's no social media.
35:47
Speaker 1: There's no contact with family, no contact with a little boyfriend, nothing,
35:53
Speaker 1: nothing at all. No Insta, no Snapchat, nothing. So given
35:59
Speaker 1: that Brian Gibbons, where do we go from there? She
36:03
Speaker 1: was out at night alone and there's been no contact
36:07
Speaker 1: with her by anyone ever since.
36:10
Speaker 13: The amount of time is extremely concerning here, Nancy, and
36:14
Speaker 13: from a digital perspective, one of the few things that
36:17
Speaker 13: we would be able to do is to see if
36:19
Speaker 13: there were logins to those accounts. This is something that
36:23
Speaker 13: police should be looking at. The second thing is any
36:26
Speaker 13: other support networks that could be sending her money, friends, acquaintances,
36:32
Speaker 13: any of these older male contacts that her parents found
36:35
Speaker 13: on the phone. That this would be the next step
36:38
Speaker 13: in the investigation.
36:39
Speaker 1: This girl is fourteen years old and out there on
36:43
Speaker 1: her own. The parents find an almost accountable contacts of
36:50
Speaker 1: people reaching out to her on social media. Who are
36:55
Speaker 1: these guys? How old are these guys?
36:57
Speaker 2: Where are these guys?
36:59
Speaker 1: And sounds of very much like Sarah Merrill when she
37:03
Speaker 1: wakes up and finds her daughter gone.
37:05
Speaker 20: I woke up in the morning.
37:06
Speaker 22: I made myself some coffee, kind of stalled and was
37:10
Speaker 22: trying to enjoy a nice, quiet Saturday morning before everyone
37:13
Speaker 22: got up, and I started to cook omelets. And then
37:16
Speaker 22: I realized it was awfully quiet and it was getting late.
37:19
Speaker 22: So I decided to go check on Ella and wake
37:22
Speaker 22: her up, and that's when I discovered she was gone.
37:24
Speaker 22: I was immediately frantic and panicking. I called her sister first,
37:31
Speaker 22: and then I hung up on her and called the police,
37:35
Speaker 22: And as in.
37:35
Speaker 1: The case of so many missing children, we find out
37:40
Speaker 1: she had been lured online.
37:42
Speaker 21: The first friend's house I stopped at.
37:44
Speaker 22: I heard concerns that she maybe with someone they had
37:47
Speaker 22: known she had been talking to online. They all had
37:50
Speaker 22: one thing in common. They all had a man from online.
37:53
Speaker 22: They all thought his name was Keith, and they all
37:56
Speaker 22: thought he came from a different state.
37:57
Speaker 23: We don't get a lot of ride shares here in
38:00
Speaker 23: and so we were able to narrow down who it was.
38:04
Speaker 23: A subject name of Keith with an address in Michigan
38:07
Speaker 23: that from.
38:08
Speaker 2: Our friends at KI NJ, Seattle.
38:10
Speaker 24: So we had taken away her phone and her internet
38:13
Speaker 24: access in our home. So every bit of conversation that
38:16
Speaker 24: she had with the man that lured her away happened
38:18
Speaker 24: at the school. On the school premises, she was kidnapped
38:23
Speaker 24: and held against her will for three hundred and ninety
38:26
Speaker 24: nine days. He starved her, He tortured her, He assaulted
38:33
Speaker 24: her in every way that you can imagine. He kept
38:36
Speaker 24: her in a dog cage for days and days at
38:40
Speaker 24: a time.
38:41
Speaker 17: He treated her.
38:44
Speaker 24: The way that he treated her was inhuman. It is
38:46
Speaker 24: so hard for me to even imagine the treatment that
38:50
Speaker 24: she received.
38:51
Speaker 2: That is Haley's mom, Shanna Burns.
38:53
Speaker 1: Hailey was found alive after being lured online from the school.
38:59
Speaker 1: Kimp Sure found alive after being lured online. To John
39:06
Speaker 1: and Jade, these are Aubrey's mom As stepdad, you believed
39:12
Speaker 1: you were doing everything possible to keep your daughter safe?
39:16
Speaker 1: Would you agree, John?
39:17
Speaker 4: Yes, I would agree, Nancy absolutely?
39:20
Speaker 2: And what do you mean by that? What were you
39:22
Speaker 2: doing to keep her safe? Parents all over the country
39:25
Speaker 2: are listening to you right now? What were you doing
39:28
Speaker 2: to keep Aubrey's safe?
39:29
Speaker 4: Well, the first thing we did was we had a
39:32
Speaker 4: very open and honest dialogue in our home. We didn't
39:35
Speaker 4: shy away from discussing the threats of these situations. And
39:39
Speaker 4: then we follow the guidance of the professionals from the
39:42
Speaker 4: medical community, and we have a structured home where we
39:47
Speaker 4: try to make sure that there's no devices laying around,
39:50
Speaker 4: there's no money laying around, there's not We spend a
39:53
Speaker 4: lot of time together as a family, right. I think
39:56
Speaker 4: that's the most important thing we did, was try to
39:59
Speaker 4: make sure you were really bonding and connecting.
40:02
Speaker 2: It's been six weeks with no sign of Aubrey. Where
40:08
Speaker 2: is this little girl? Who did she meet online?
40:16
Speaker 1: The last known signing was at Panera Bread after nine pm.
40:24
Speaker 1: If you know or think you know anything about Aubrey's whereabouts.
40:30
Speaker 1: Please help us while there's still time to save her.
40:35
Speaker 1: Six one zero seven five nine two two hundred repeat
40:40
Speaker 1: six one zero seven five nine two hundred. To Jade
40:47
Speaker 1: Aubrey's mom, what is your message to your daughter tonight?
40:52
Speaker 17: Jade Aubrey, No matter who you encounter, what you've been through,
40:57
Speaker 17: I'm here for you. I'm here for you always, yesterday, today, tomorrow.
41:04
Speaker 17: I miss you every second and I'm worried sick. If
41:08
Speaker 17: you are there, you can see this. Let me know
41:11
Speaker 17: you are safe, and reach out and call nine one
41:15
Speaker 17: one if you are in danger.
41:16
Speaker 3: I know you're a smart girl.
41:18
Speaker 4: You can't do this. I'm waiting for you.
41:20
Speaker 13: Just let me know.
41:22
Speaker 9: And if anything called nine one one, Please I wait
41:26
Speaker 9: for you to come home. I can't wait to see you,
41:29
Speaker 9: and I miss you so much every second I'm awake.
41:34
Speaker 1: Guys, please help us find Aubrey again. There is a
41:38
Speaker 1: chance to bring her home alive.
41:41
Speaker 18: That number.
41:42
Speaker 1: Six one zero seven five nine two two hundred. Nancy
41:48
Speaker 1: Gray signing off, goodbye friend,