Kidnapping of Jaycee Dugard



Childhood photo of Dugard

Reappearance: University of California, Berkeley
Dates: June 10, 1991 – August 26, 2009

The kidnapping of Jaycee Dugard occurred on June 10, 1991, in Meyers, California. Dugard was 11 years old when she was abducted from a street while walking to a school bus stop. Searches began immediately after Dugard's disappearance, but no reliable leads were generated, though her stepfather, Carl Probyn, witnessed her kidnapping and chased the kidnappers on his mountain bike. Dugard remained missing until 2009, when a convicted sex offender, Phillip Garrido, visited the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, accompanied by two adolescent girls, now known to be the biological daughters of Garrido and Dugard, on August 24 and 25 that year. The unusual behavior of the trio sparked an investigation that led Garrido's parole officer to order him to take the two girls to a parole office in Concord, California, on August 26. He was accompanied by a woman who was finally identified as Dugard herself.

Phillip and Nancy Garrido were arrested by police after Dugard's reappearance. On April 28, 2011, they pleaded guilty to kidnapping and assaulting Dugard. Law enforcement officers believe Dugard was later kept in concealed tents, sheds, and lean-tos in an area behind the Garridos' house at 1554 Walnut Avenue in Antioch, California, for 18 years. During her confinement, Dugard gave birth to two daughters, who were 11 and 15 at the time of her reappearance. On June 2, 2011, Garrido was sentenced to 431 years to life imprisonment; his wife, Nancy, also received 36 years to life. Garrido is a person of interest in at least one other San Francisco Bay Area missing-person case.

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Reappearance

On August 24, 2009, Garrido visited the San Francisco office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and left a four-page essay containing his ideas about religion and sexuality, suggesting that he had discovered a solution to problem behaviors like his past crimes. The essay described how he had cured his criminal sexual behaviors and how that information could be used to assist in curing other sexual predators by "controlling human impulses that drive humans to commit dysfunctional acts". On the same day, he went to a University of California police office with Dugard's two daughters, seeking permission to hold a special event on campus as a part of his "God's Desire" program. He spoke with special-events manager Lisa Campbell; she perceived his behavior as "erratic" and felt that the girls were "sullen and submissive." She asked Garrido to make an appointment for the next day, which he did, leaving his name in the process. Officer Ally Jacobs ran a background check and discovered that Garrido was a registered sex offender on federal parole for kidnapping and rape. Garrido and the girls returned for their appointment at 2 p.m. the following day, and Jacobs attended the meeting. The girls appeared to Jacobs to be pale, as if they had not been exposed to sunlight, and she felt that their behavior was unusual. Garrido's several parole violations were a basis for an arrest, so Jacobs phoned the parole office to relay her concerns, leaving a report on voicemail.

After hearing Jacobs' recorded message, two parole agents drove to the Garridos' house later that day. Upon arrival, they handcuffed him and searched the house, finding only his wife Nancy and his elderly mother at home. Then, the parole agents drove him back to the parole office. En route, Garrido said that the girls who had accompanied him to UC Berkeley "were the daughters of a relative,” and that he had had permission from their parents to take them to the university. Although a month before, the parole office had barred Garrido from associating with minors, and although Berkeley was 40 miles (64 km) from the Garridos' Contra Costa residence — 15 miles (24 km) in excess of the 25-mile (40 km) limit he was allowed to travel from his home without his parole agent's permission — nothing was done about these violations. After reviewing his file with a supervisor, they drove Garrido home and ordered him to report to the office again the next day to discuss his visit to UC Berkeley, and to follow up on the office's concerns about the two girls.

Garrido arrived at the parole office in Concord, California, on August 26 with his wife, Nancy, the two girls, and Dugard, who was introduced as "Allissa". The parole officer decided to separate Garrido from the women and girls to obtain their identification.

Maintaining her false identity as "Allissa", Dugard told investigators that the girls were her daughters. Although she indicated that she was aware that Garrido was a convicted sex offender, she stated that he was a "changed man", a "great person", and was "good with her kids", comments that were echoed by the two girls. When pressed for details that would confirm her identity, Dugard became "extremely defensive" and "agitated", demanding to know why she was being "interrogated", and subsequently stated that she was a battered wife from Minnesota in hiding from her abusive husband. The parole officer eventually called the Concord police. Upon the arrival of a police sergeant, Garrido admitted he had kidnapped and raped her. Only after this did Dugard identify herself as Jaycee Dugard. It was later suggested that Dugard showed signs of Stockholm syndrome. In a 2016 ABC News interview with Diane Sawyer, Dugard stated that her compassion and willingness to interact with her captor were her only means of surviving, saying, "The phrase [Stockholm Syndrome] implies that hostages cracked by terror and abuse become affectionate towards their captors...Well, it's, really, it's degrading, you know, having my family believe that I was in love with this captor and wanted to stay with him. I mean, that is so far from the truth that it makes me want to throw up...I adapted to survive my circumstance." Repeatedly during this segment of the interview, she stated that, as a way to survive, and hoping to end abuse, many victims are forced to sympathize with their captors.

Garrido and his wife were placed under arrest. An FBI agent put Dugard on the telephone with her mother, Terry Probyn. Dugard retained custody of her children and was soon reunited with her mother.

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