Jaycee Dugard: One Year Later

by Stacy Dittrich

This past Thursday, August 26, 2010, marked the one year anniversary of Jaycee Lee Dugard’s (pictured left) return to her family. As most people know, Jaycee was eleven years old when she was viciously ripped from her family while walking to her bus stop in South Lake Tahoe, California, on June 10, 1991. This occurred as her step-father, Carl Probyn, watched helplessly. For the next 18 years, Dugard’s captors, Philip Craig Garrido, 58, and his wife, Nancy Garrido, 54, held young Jaycee in a wretched, filthy, compound of tents—well hidden behind their Antioch, California, home. For 18 years, Garrido repeatedly raped Jaycee and she eventually bore two of his children.

On August 26, 2009 the nation came to a virtual standstill when the news of Jaycee’s survival spread like wildfire. Garrido, with Jaycee and their two daughters, ages 12 and 15, was eyed suspiciously by the University of Berkeley police officers when he arrived on campus spewing religious rants. After a highly praised interrogation by the officers, Jaycee’s true identity—and her past—was revealed. The detailed information that followed shocked and sickened humanity. Furthermore, people were angry that such an abomination continued for 18 years without detection. California’s parole system came under intense scrutiny for failing to discover Jaycee in Garrido’s hold. Having been on parole for several decades, Garrido routinely played nice with his parole officers and his home was never searched.

In 1992, a report to the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Department revealed a man claiming he saw a young girl matching Jaycee’s description staring at a missing poster of herself at a nearby gas station. The caller claims the girl left with a man matching Garrido’s description in a large yellow van (the same vehicle that was later towed from Garrido’s property in 2009). The tip was never followed-up on. Along with the numerous missed opportunities by parole agents, another tip was phoned into the sheriff’s department by one of Garrido’s neighbors. The neighbor claimed that Garrido, a known sex offender and psychotic, had young children living in his back yard. The deputy that arrived to investigate the complaint never even searched the back yard (pictured right). Thus, the unconscionable lack of justice for Jaycee Dugard resulted in a $20 million  settlement from the state of California. Well deserved, but considering that Jaycee, and her daughters’, lifelong therapy is estimated to cost $7 million I’d say she deserved a hell of a lot more than that.

Now, a year later, Jaycee and her daughters live in seclusion with her mother, Terry Probyn, in Northern California. Many wonder what the last year has been like for the newly reunited family, and what does the future hold. The last year for Jaycee has been an onslaught of new beginnings; she obtained her driver’s license, maintains a journal, baked Christmas cookies with her mother and sister for the first time, and even recently went camping with friends. They live in an undisclosed small neighborhood where it has been reported that their neighbors are “fiercely” protective of Jaycee and her family. Rumors have been floating around for quite some time that Jaycee will be writing a book of her time spent in hell, and her mother’s account of her own nightmare is due to be published in late 2010. Regardless, evil Garrido and his disgusting robot-of-a-wife, Nancy, (pictured right to left) are still incarcerated awaiting trial. Most likely both will die in prison. Hallelujah.

A year later, in the rare moments where Jaycee (now 30) is shown in photographs, she is smiling. Personally, I find that to be an extremely positive sign. Although she and her children have a long road ahead, they are back where they belong. Good luck, Jaycee; you and your family will continuously be in our thoughts and prayers.

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The Monster's Wife, Culpable?

by Contributors to Women in Crime Ink

Police have charged Nancy Garrido along with her husband, Phillip, for abducting and imprisoning Jaycee Dugard for the past 18 years. Both are charged with 29 counts each, ranging from kidnapping to rape. Dugard's stepfather has identified Nancy, a nursing assistant believed to have assisted in the delivery of Dugard's two children, as the woman who snatched his stepdaughter off the street, and police say Nancy (left) was home with the then 11-year-old for five months while her husband cooled his heels in jail on a parole violation. Meanwhile, her attorney maintains Nancy's innocence, saying she too was her husband's victim, kept under Garrido's control.

The question for WCI bloggers: If it turns out that Nancy Garrido is involved in this heinous crime, and if it turns out that she's been a victim of prolonged domestic violence, how much weight should this be given, and should it impact guilt/innocence or sentencing?

Pat Brown: Nancy Garrido deserves to accept full responsibility for her actions. Why? Because she wasn't an innocent girl like Jaycee who might have been snared by an older Phillip Garrido and brainwashed. She was a full grown adult who met Garrido when he was already in prison and she knew he was in prison for kidnapping and rape. She chose to partner with him, and she chose to participate in his criminal activities. She is as guilty as he is for what happened to Jaycee Dugard (left) and her children. I say a life sentence without parole is fully appropriate for Nancy Garrido.

Andrea Campbell: In my opinion, if Nancy Garrido was free to come and go, yet still aided in perpetuating the kidnapping and crime against Jaycee Dugard, and then allowed it to continue with the imprisonment of the children, she should be charged as a co-conspirator. At the very least, it is criminal aiding and abetting.

Kathryn Casey: It appears that Nancy Garrido had every opportunity to turn her husband in and end the nightmare for Jaycee and her family. If that’s true, it’s fitting that she’s held responsible right along with the monster she chose as her husband. What woman marries a man in prison for kidnap and rape, allegedly assists in a kidnapping once he's released, and then sits back and does nothing while he imprisons and violates a child? Should abuse by Garrido against Nancy come in at all? Sure, in sentencing. If Nancy has been victimized by her husband, the jury or judge who hands down the sentence should be able to fully assess the entire picture.

Diane Fanning: Nancy Garrido should be judged solely by her actions in the guilt/innocence phase of the trial. If the state proves--as I believe they will--that she aided and abetted in the crimes committed against Jaycee Dugard and in keeping her captivity a secret for all these years. Then, she should be found guilty of all of that. If there was on-going long-term, verifiable domestic violence perpetrated on Nancy, that should be considered as a mitigating circumstance only during the sentencing phase and weighed against the actions she took or did not take regarding Jaycee.

Susan Murphy-Milano: Nancy Garrido is a full-fledged accomplice and co-conspirator, who in my opinion willingly participated in the crimes against a helpless child. Garrido should receive no mercy and have her lawyer strike from the court record the untruths told about her being a battered woman.

Jaycee Dugard was locked away like a caged animal from the outside world behind a series of fences, sheds and tents in the back of a suburban home. She was brainwashed and raped for years and gave birth to two children, the first when Jaycee was about 14. Those children, both girls now 11 and 15, also were kept hidden away in the caged compound.

I am reminded of Michelle Lyn Michaud, also of Sacramento, sentenced to death for her role in the 1997 kidnap, rape and murder of a 22-year-old student. During the trial, defense attorneys also tried to portray Michaud as a battered woman who would do anything to please her boyfriend, James Daveggio, who also was sentenced to death.

Nancy Garrido is a predator, and the battered-women’s theory is a way to mask and not take responsibility for her heinous crimes.

Katherine Scardino: Nancy Garrido should be judged solely on her own actions - if it is proven that she herself committed a direct criminal act - such as kidnapping, assault or some other direct act against another individual, or an act that is a crime by omission - meaning that she should have taken some reasonable action to prevent a criminal act - such as injury to a child by omission - she will be tried for her own crimes.

If her crime is an act by omission, then it is possible that she'd been so brainwashed or assaulted by this man that she could not take any preventative measures to protect or save Ms. Dugard. That may come in during the guilt phase of the trial - but generally, as Diane said, that information would only be admissible during the sentencing phase of a trial as possible mitigating evidence, just like information about a person's background - i.e., child abuse, sexual assault, beatings, etc. The jury can hear and consider this evidence when deliberating her punishment. The jury can give whatever weight they feel is appropriate to this type of information.

Cathy Scott: If Nancy Garrido was involved in the kidnapping and imprisonment of Jaycee Dugard, then, yes, she should pay. But I do believe some consideration -- even compassion -- should be afforded her if it turns out that she too was a victim of Philip Garrido (above right). The control from such a twisted and sociopathic mind reaches beyond prison bars, which may partly explain Garrido's failure to report her husband once he was jailed.

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Left Behind

by Lisa R. Cohen

I've been thinking a lot about the Jaycee Dugard story, of course, because of the similarities to the Etan Patz case. Blond, beautiful Jaycee was abducted off her bicycle 18 years ago while on her way to school. Blond, beautiful, six-year-old Etan was abducted 30 years ago, walking the two short blocks to the school bus stop, on his own for the first time. Jaycee's stepdad was considered a suspect for years, as was Stan Patz, Etan's dad.

But then there are those important differences in the two cases: unlike Stan and Julie Patz, Jaycee's folks didn't sustain their marriage through such tragedy; and unlike Jaycee -- Etan never came home.

There's been so much talk about Jaycee's two daughters and how they will adjust to their shattering, new reality. But I've also been wondering about how this bombshell is affecting Jaycee's other family - her mother and stepfather, and her younger sister Shana who was just a baby when Jaycee disappeared.

Over the years, the Patzes had a lot of contact with other families of missing children. So much about the tragedy of an abducted or missing child is specific to that one circumstance and simply can't be understood except by another family in the same straits. It's like a terrible, exclusive club no one wants to be a member of.

In 1984, five years after Etan disappeared, Julie took her younger son, then 7-year-old Ari, on a very unique retreat organized by psychotherapist Gary Hewitt. Amid the growing voices clamoring for much needed new legislation on the issue, Hewitt's Center for Missing Children specialized in a narrow spot on the missing child spectrum, one that received little attention but demonstrated a huge need -- the families, and especially the children, left behind. Hewitt treated such families, as well as the rare young victims who returned, carrying the emotional baggage of their captivity.

Julie hoped the retreat would be helpful for Ari. He had come to her on his seventh birthday to express relief that he'd made it through the scary age of six, but a year later he was still suffering the effects of his brother's loss. He'd recently spent hours up in the night weeping after a particularly bad nightmare. Now he would celebrate his eighth birthday at a lakefront resort in upstate New York, in the company of trained therapists and siblings of other missing children.

On the first night, some 60 strangers sang to Ari, then shared his birthday cake after a buffet dinner at Keuka College, 212 gloriously green acres in the Finger Lake region. Gary Hewitt presented the boy with a newly minted coin set for his collection and hoped the familiar birthday ritual would help break the ice at this somber, awkward gathering of 14 families.

But it would take more than cake and party balloons to chip away at their sorrow. These were mothers and fathers who'd molded themselves rigidly into an unnatural public persona, or had kept an isolated vigil by the phone in hopes of a call. Many had completely lost sight of relating to other people. Looking around, Julie felt the oppressive weight of the collective tragedy. She doubted whether some of these people had smiled or laughed once since their child had disappeared.

The next day, at the first working sessions, the adults were split off from the children, as everyone divided their time between group therapy and play. Parents talked to parents, kids to kids. Ari sat in a classroom with other children ranging from seven to 17, who were encouraged to tell their stories. Gradually, the youngsters opened up, but it wasn't until the evening when the families came together again, that the parents had their own protective ice broken...by their children.

One after another, with safety in numbers, the youngest voices said what they'd been holding inside. Our brother or sister may be gone, but we're still here. We need to get out of the house, move forward, take a vacation, be normal. Every aspect of life had been on hold, and these children were suffering for that too, not just for the loss of their loved one. As parents listened, and the tears flowed, the adults acknowledged what their children were saying.

Talking about such things for the first time had a profound effect, but it wasn't the only healing tool. In between the talking and listening was what Julie jokingly called the "forced" recreation. These were people who had lost the ability to relax and to feel unencumbered by their grief, or by the appearance they needed to maintain, so that neighbors wouldn't find it unseemly, even suspicious to see the laughing. At Keuka, they were cajoled into waterskiing, swimming and canoeing. There was t'ai chi in the mornings for the most sedentary of the adults and counselors who doubled as clowns armed with balloon animals for the youngest of the kids. And there were goofy parlor games, designed to coax laughter from even the most disconsolate.

It was a rare adventure for all the children and an even rarer break for the parents. For Julie, the entire Keuka retreat was a singular experience, one she would never forget. For the first time in five years she was spending time with other parents - besides her husband Stan - who had shared the same horror she had, and they were free of media, law-enforcement and other "non" victims. She didn't have to worry what anyone thought of her when she cried over an irrational fear, or more importantly, laughed at a joke. For the first time in a long time, she was with a group of peers, so she could feel - almost - normal.

Both she and Ari also spent time with 18-year-old Steven Stayner and his parents. Steven had left his Northern California home in 1972 a freckle faced seven year old, and reappeared eight years later almost a full grown man. Once home, Stayner had struggled to adapt to a life that on the one hand was free of the abuse he'd suffered in his captor's clutches, but on the other hand was bounded by the parental limits he'd shed during his time away. But Julie and Ari saw a polite, pleasant young man, and a functioning reunited family, and it was evidence that it could be done.

Let's hope that in the future, Jaycee's family will be able to share such experiences with other families too. They could use time away from the rest of the world in the company of others who've been through something similar, even though very few ever have. Again, being able to feel that shared experience will give them one of the most precious healing tools there is at such a challenging time - a sense of normalcy.

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Some Just Aren’t Wired Right: The Summer of Statistical Anomalies

by Stacy Dittrich

After the horrific case involving the brutal abduction, murder, and sexual assault of eight-year-old Sandra Cantu in which a local Sunday school teacher, Melissa Huckaby, 28 (pictured left), is charged, most of us came out screaming, “That’s a statistical anomaly!" It very rarely happens. To find that a woman who looks like a typical PTA mom is allegedly a rapist and child murderer makes even those of us with steel stomachs shudder. When it came to the Cantu case, I was as guilty as everyone else who assumed the murderer would be a male.

Shockingly, it was my own 13-year-old daughter who set me straight. While watching coverage of the Cantu case back in March, my daughter entered the room and paused. “Did they catch who killed that little girl yet?” she asked, quietly. “No,” I answered, “but they’ll get him soon, no doubt.” My daughter gave me a funny look and said in her young and authoritative voice, “How do you know it’s a him, Mom? It could be a woman who did that!” I simply raised my eyebrow at her and calmly explained, “That’s ridiculous. Of course it’s a man who did it! Women don’t sexually assault little girls, and rarely anyone, for crying out loud.” Getting in her last word, as teenagers like to do, she left the room, muttering under her breath, “I think you’re wrong…”

Imagine the "I told you so's" reverberating through my home when Huckaby’s arrest was announced. It was one of those moments where I paced back and forth, scratching my head and wondering how the hell I missed it while my teenager got it right. Ironically, the case stayed in the back of my mind; I didn't know I would be approached to write the book on Cantu's murder. I couldn’t have imagined, as my daughter and I had our exchange, that I would be flying to San Francisco at the end of September to face the “Statistical Anomaly,” i.e. the aforementioned Melissa Huckaby — to watch her in court and conduct research for the book. Because the case sent such a poignant and stark reminder to parents to be careful of everyone, not just strangers, I agreed to do it.

When Jaycee Lee Dugard walked into a Concord, CA., police department on August 26 accompanied by her two daughters, she also became one of the dreaded “statistical anomalies.” The chances of a child falling victim to a stranger abduction and surviving, then being found 18 years later after bearing her abductors children, are minuscule. Jaycee Dugard shattered the experts' predictions on such cases. God help us if she talks to investigators and leads them to other crimes, perhaps even murders, her captor, Philip Garrido, (pictured right) may have committed over the past 18 years.

Oh, but it’s not over yet. I came across this headline last week: “Michigan Mom Found Long-Lost Son Online, Raped Him.” I figured there had to be more to it so I pulled up the article. There was more to it alright—a nauseating and disturbing account of an attractive Michigan woman, Aimee Louis Sword, 35, (pictured left) of Waterford Township near Detroit who had given her son up for adoption over 10 years ago. For unknown reasons she decided to track him down online. She found him and made arrangements to meet. Prosecutors on the case maintain the meeting consisted of Sword seducing, and raping her teenage son.

I simply don’t know what to say.

Detroit Sinai Grace Hospital Dr. Gerald Shiener had a similar reaction: “I’m at a loss for words because it’s something we consider to be so out of the normal, so prohibited in every culture that it unnerves every man just to think about it…it’s an abomination.”

Abomination? Statistical Anomaly? I have a better term: Evil — plain and simple. For me, these cases solidify the notion I’ve long held about certain people: We can blame upbringing, drugs, alcohol, years of abuse, and mental anguish but the bottom line with those who commit such crimes is that they were simply born bad.

These types of criminals weren't wired right at birth and have no acceptable place in society; they will never change, they will always be evil, and they can’t be re-wired no matter how skilled the mechanic is. Even more frightening is the fact that there are hundreds, if not thousands, out there roaming our streets and threatening our children. So, the questions society needs to answer: What do we do with them then? Where do we put them?

Obviously, I have strong opinions on these matters. What are yours?

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