Episode Transcript
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Today we are going to be talking about the kidnapping of J.C. Lee Dugard.
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This is J.C., beautiful little girl. She was 11 years old at the time of her kidnapping,
which occurred on June 10, 1991, in South Lake Tahoe, California.
She had a stepfather named Carl, a mother, Terri, and a little sister named Shauna.
The parents had moved to South Lake Tahoe nine months before her abduction.
They thought it would be safer there than Orange County, California, where they had lived before.
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It was just a normal school day. Her mom was at work.
J.C. was in fifth grade at the time, and her biggest concern was an upcoming field trip
and whether or not she could shave her legs. She was going to ask her mom to shave.
She had no idea what was coming, and this was a really safe area.
They actually moved there because it was a safer area than where they previously lived.
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That day, J.C. was walking to the bus stop. It was a warm, sunny day, beautiful,
normal day in California. It was June 10, 1991, and as she was halfway up the hill to her bus stop,
a car pulled up next to her, and she thought it was someone asking for directions.
But before she could say anything, she fell to the ground paralyzed.
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She had been tasered by a man named Philip Garrido. She was unconscious. She had wet her pants.
There was a car that came down the hill, circled in front of the house,
went back up the hill, and when it got to Jace, the car cut off her path.
The driver jumped out, grabbed J.C., and I have not seen her since.
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Her stepfather actually saw this. He hopped on a bike and chased after the car,
but they got away fast enough that he didn't even see a license plate.
I wish I would have my keys in my pocket. It catches you totally off guard.
They had the advantage. They had the car in, you know.
And this man was not alone. He was actually with his wife, Nancy Garrido,
and she actually found J.C. and helped him kidnap her as a gift for him,
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and just like that, J.C. was gone. When J.C. woke up, she was telling them,
my parents can't afford a ransom. She was obviously terrified,
and the journey ahead to freedom for her was a very, very rough road.
Her mom was seriously heartbroken. Terry and her were so close.
The Garridos brought her all the way back to their house in Contra Costa County.
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And remember, J.C. is 11 years old. First day, Philip handcuffed her,
brought her in the shower with him, and abused her.
And this was a start of a pattern of him doing this all the time.
He believed he had a addiction and that something was telling him to sleep with little girls.
And Philip and Nancy had this whole bizarre setup in their backyard.
It was like a bunch of shacks and tarps and sheds,
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and just like weird structures in their backyard.
They had quite a bit of land. And that's where they first put J.C.
After that happened, they put a blanket over her and brought her out into the backyard into a shed,
and that would become J.C.'s new home. They put her in a really tiny shed,
and the shed was soundproof, so she couldn't even scream for help.
Not only that, but Phil told her that if she did try to run,
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that he had attack dogs in the backyard that would kill her.
He kidnapped her to be his slave in his backyard. He would tell her,
I am doing this to you, and you are saving other little girls by me doing this to you,
because I don't have to do this to them. And he literally locked her up in this shed
with a bucket as a bathroom. She had nothing.
No companionship she barely spent any time even with them. She was just alone a lot.
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And there's a lot of details in J.C.'s book about what day-to-day life was like in captivity,
but basically, she was constantly bribed with fast food.
McDonald's, french fries, milkshakes, things like that which is not an uncommon way to bribe kids,
or make them feel comfortable, or get them to somehow trust you as a captor.
At first, she had no form of entertainment, nothing to do. Eventually, he gave her a TV,
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but wouldn't allow her to watch the news because he was worried that she would see
coverage of her disappearance. After the car sped off,
Carl called 911. Within the hour, police officers were at Carl and Terry's home.
Police started searching the neighborhood, looking for the two-tone gray car.
Neighbors were called upon to see if there were other witnesses.
Descriptions of the car and the female passenger were distributed throughout the community.
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Pictures of J.C. were placed in storefronts, and Carl and Terry embarked on what turned out to be
an endless campaign to find their daughter. This is J.C.'s room. Pretty much the way it was.
I've added a few things. Some of her things that she had stuffed in the drawer that I thought
needed to be brought out. I definitely like to be in here. It brings back memories, good memories,
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of all the good times that we had. And then that puts me close to Jace,
coming in and being next to her even though she's not here. She's still in my heart.
And in the meantime, Terry was doing everything she could to find her daughter.
I mean, this woman did not give up. She even had friends quit their jobs to help her with the
search. They had so many volunteers for the search. Tons of people were looking for her,
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put up tons of posters and flyers all around the country. Actually, they sent them to businesses
all around the country. Since her favorite color was pink and she disappeared in all pink outfit,
her hometown put pink ribbons all around as a constant reminder of her disappearance.
Terry also founded a group called J.C.'s Hope, which directed all the search efforts and volunteer
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work. It lifts my spirit real high. I'm overwhelmed. More than I can ask for.
This is going to bring her home. I know it. The guards family has maintained a high-profile
sensor disappearance, passing out hundreds of thousands of flyers, canvassing several states
in search of their missing daughter. Victoria Campbell continues team coverage with a look
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at the family's latest effort, a song in J.C.'s honor. And whenever I sing it, sometimes it's hard
to get through it. It really is because it's a very sad situation. I want J.C. to hear it,
and I want the abductors that took J.C. to hear it and know that she's in everybody's heart.
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J.C.'s mother, Terry, speaks a part on the song and it still brings tears.
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The song, simply entitled J.C. Lee, will be sent to every radio station in northern Nevada.
It's all part of a vast effort to find J.C. Lee Dugard. Both singer and songwriter say they
wanted to do their part. Her mother is still pleading with everyone to keep on searching for
her. She is coming home. That gives me a lot of hope, a lot of optimism. Somebody's, you know,
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feeding me dreams for a reason. She was extremely scared and confused. In her book, she talks a lot
about how she held out hope because of her mother. She and her mother had this whole thing with the
moon. J.C. and her would debate whether or not the full moon or the crescent moon was better.
So she would feel like she was connecting to her mom every time she would look at the moon
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because she knew her mom was looking at the same moon. What's so interesting is that Terry was
doing the same thing. They really were keeping each other strong and keeping each other motivated
and inspired to get out of this situation and to save her daughter. We would debate whether the
full moon or the crescent moon was the better moon. I always liked the full moon and she liked
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the crescent. Philip was not a nice guy. He believed in different kinds of angels and all types of weird
religions. He would listen to voices in the wall. This guy was so off his rocker and was his wife
was like condoning this. He would do these like drug binges where he would take a bunch of drugs
and he would dress her up in different outfits. He would do all these different weird scenarios
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and then obviously would abuse her. This happened all the time. What was so weird is that after
Philip would do this he would cry and apologize and say what a horrible man he is. He would also say
angels told him to do this. Demon angels. His wife would also apologize to her and say oh this is so
sad I can't believe he did this. I can't believe he took you even though she was the one helping him.
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In fact they found footage of her filming Philip in a park. He would stand in a park, play guitar
and she would film it. Zoom in on kids in the background is like potential people to take.
Okay now see the zoom lens. Oh you can zoom in. Oh no did you push that? Yeah.
Is this going far enough? Maybe you can pop it on your knee. That's why I popped this.
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You got me real good? Yes.
I can see you're really good.
After some more time passed, Jaycee I guess started getting stronger. She said she cried less but she's still crying pretty much every day. But they did give her a journal which is interesting. Now all of her days in there are recorded in a document and that was interesting that they would let her write. She would write all kinds of stuff. They also gave her kittens to bribe her. I think they figured it would give her something to do. They gave her several cats and they'd tell
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her the cats were like super expensive, like $200. She felt so grateful that they gave her these cats. Sadly the cats kept disappearing. Jaycee always figured that Philip killed them and then on April 3rd of 1994 she was 13 years old. Philip and Nancy were having dinner with her. They were watching TV and they told her that they think she is pregnant. At this point she was already four months pregnant with her first child at age 13. She didn't even understand the connection between sex
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and babies. Obviously they weren't going to take her to a doctor to get checked out or even let her give birth in any type of hospital. She was going to give birth right in that room and Philip said he was going to do it. He was going to watch birthing videos and figure out how to deliver a baby. The only preparation she had was TV shows about pregnancy. Then a few months later, August 18th of 1994, Jaycee is 14 years old. She started having contractions. What was crazy is she was locked in the room.
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She had no way to communicate with them. They didn't even give her like a walkie talkie or any way to communicate with them. She hadn't seen anyone that whole day and she started realizing I'm about to give birth. No one's here. I'm by myself. I'm in excruciating pain and who knows where Philip is. Eventually they came in and they delivered her baby and it wasn't without complications either. The baby had a cord wrapped around her neck. Phil reached in like a doctor would and took it off her neck and then she came
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out. Jaycee was actually thrilled even though half the DNA of this baby is her captor. She still felt so happy to have someone who was related to her. That was her baby. It was a way to connect with her mother even. And not only that, but she also had something to do. She wasn't alone. She had something to give her hope. So honestly, even though it sounds so traumatic, having a baby in captivity for Jaycee I think was one of the best things for her mental health. It gave her so many reasons to live.
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She actually had another child a few years later and she taught them in the backyard. She set up a little school and tried to teach them even though she was only educated until fifth grade. At this point they had forced her to go by a different name. She chose the name Alyssa and even worse, the mom.
Nancy was so insecure and jealous of Jaycee. She wanted to be there getting abused by her husband. But Nancy was jealous of her being the mother of the kids and Philip said, from now on the girls are going to grow up thinking that Nancy is their mom and you are their sister and you're not allowed to tell them otherwise. So that's also very devastating to Jaycee.
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What's interesting about this case is she had several times where she could have gotten out. Not by her choice. She had several encounters with people who could have helped her. First, she met a neighbor boy through another yard and he asked her who she was, where she lived, and she said she lived there so the boy never thought anything of it.
As time went on, in the 2000s, Philip decided to start a printing business and he actually hired Jaycee. Well, he didn't hire her, he didn't pay her, but he made her do some of the work. But I think this was also kind of good for her in a weird way because it gave her something to focus on.
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Now what's crazy is she even talked to at least one customer on the phone and never said anything and what's really interesting about Jaycee is she was very mentally controlled by Philip, but she never had Stockholm Syndrome. She was terrified of leaving because she'd been manipulated and brainwashed.
She did not love Philip, she did not want to stay with him, she did not enjoy life. She always knew he was a bad guy. She wanted to get away from him and she actually gets very offended when people refer to her actions as Stockholm Syndrome because she was in this from such a young age that it was scary to even think about leaving.
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Jaycee had access to an email account and to the phone and never reached out for help from anybody. It would only be a few clicks and she could possibly have connected with her mother or called the police or something like that and she never did. She was worried that the computer would track everything she did and Philip would punish her.
By 2009, investigators believe that Jaycee was moved to another yard in the back of the backyard. It was like a second backyard. He really went to all lengths to hide them because now he doesn't just have Jaycee, he has two girls.
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What's so frustrating about this story is the lack of help from the police. Philip was on probation. At one point while Jaycee was captive he actually went back to jail and two officers visited their home, came into their home, looked outside but didn't check the backyard, didn't check the whole thing.
And one of those times Jaycee was in the house because eventually when they realized she wasn't going to try to run away, they were really way easier on her. They didn't handcuff her, so she was just in their house and she actually talked to the parole officer. She like had a conversation and this guy didn't think anything was weird about it.
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That's where we sleep.
What does a parole agent do for his parolee?
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The other guy.
I know it.
You're on parole.
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You guys have further questions coming to the office?
Last time you refused for me to be a witness in there.
It is so weird too because eventually neighbors saw her and like multiple neighbors knew of her, didn't know exactly who she was but figured she, you know, she's not trying to leave so she must live there. She would even answer the door for people and talk to neighbors but would never tell them who she was or asked to leave and she always went by Alyssa. She was just doing what she had to do to survive.
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Law enforcement had record of Philip Guarido kidnapping someone in 1979. The fact that they did not look into him or connect the two was baffling. In April of 1992, a man saw JC in a gas station looking intently at a picture of herself on the wall, missing child's poster of her and he calls to report it to the police.
And one time in 2006, a woman actually called the police and reported strange tense in the Guarido's backyard and children who seemed to be living in the backyard and the police never did anything.
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This guy was a sex offender, a kidnapper and on parole and they didn't even check.
And then finally on August 24th of 2009, JC and her two daughters and Nancy and Philip went to the UC Berkeley campus so that he could run around screaming about his religion on the campus and basically harass people and act like a freak. He believed he was hearing things.
He was a chosen one by God. I mean this guy was so bonkers. And two Berkeley police officers noticed him and noticed the girls that were standing with him and of course JC wasn't acting like she was kidnapped.
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She was not mouthing helped at anyone. She wasn't planning on going anywhere. This was her life pretty much now. These two female police officers on the campus felt like something was weird.
And this is totally women's intuition. They both had a strange feeling about the girls. They thought they were acting kind of off. And even though they never gave any signals to make them think something was wrong.
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This is so important because even if they were wrong it is important to tell people. This is how the bystander effect happens. If you see something and you get a strange feeling and something feels off, you got to report it even if you're wrong.
It is it's okay to be wrong because if these women hadn't done anything, JC could be still in captivity today.
Hi, this is JC Dugard.
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Just ask yourself to care.
If you see something that looks wrong or a myth, speak out. You might be wrong, but you might just save someone's life.
They talked to Philip for a while, trying to convince him that they were interested in his religion. They asked for his name. Once they finally got his name, they looked it up and they found out that he was a sex offender.
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So, all of them were brought into the police station. At first, JC wasn't cooperating. She wouldn't tell them her real name. She just said, My name's Alyssa. They could tell though that she wasn't related to them. And once they saw his record, they were like, Oh my God, this girl's most likely been kidnapped.
After a while, she said, Okay, I'll tell you my real name, but I'm afraid to say it out loud. Can I have a piece of paper? And she wrote down JC Lee Dugard and obviously the police freaked out. I mean, at this point, JC had been in captivity for 18 years. Her daughters were 11 and 15. Once they figured out who she was, they asked her if she wanted to call her mom. And of course she said yes.
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They're like, You can see your mom. And I'm like, I can, I can see my mom. It was like a question to them, you know, I can. You're at the office, the phone rings. Unbelievable. And then it was disbelief. I thought, No, you're joking. Don't don't do this to me. This is not funny. And I remember you shouting.
Oh, yeah. And I was crying, you know, when you're crying, you can't speak. I just said, Come quick. I remember saying, Come, come quick. And I remember telling you, I'm coming, baby. I'm coming.
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She was at work when she got the call that JC was there and she had to wait for her mom to get there. So they obviously arrested Philip and Nancy. JC was reunited with her mother. JC was also rewarded $20 million by the state of California because of the parole officers who failed to find three captive women in this house. And as for Philip and Nancy, they will be in jail the rest of their lives.
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The serial sex offender who held JC Dugard hostage for nearly two decades has been ordered to spend the rest of his life behind bars. Philip Garrido appeared in a Northern California courtroom on Thursday, where he was sentenced to 431 years in prison as part of a plea deal. But she issued a bold statement through her mother telling Garrido, I chose not to be here today because I refused to waste another second of my life in your presence. She went on to say, I hated every second of every day of 18 years because of you and the sexual perversion you forced on me.
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Nancy Garrido was sentenced to 36 years to life after pleading guilty to kidnapping and rape. As for JC, she is still working with her foundation.
I'm so thankful for the team of people that have supported me throughout these last few years. I am so grateful to all of you. I can't say they have been easy, but anything in worth life and life worth doing is sometimes hard, like speaking.
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Give me a comment and like below. Let me know what you think of this whole story and that's it for me today guys. I will see you next time. Until then be safe out there and watch out for yourself and others.