Rotten Mango - #107: The Barbie Doll Kidnapper (Case of Katie Beers)

Episode Date: October 20, 2021

“Big John” loved his little apartment. It wasn’t nice but it was his. He was in his 40’s and he wanted to decorate it with whatever style he pleased. His bedroom was more of a game room with a mattress on the ground. The walk-in closet was wall-to-wall with the newest and latest games. Nintendo games, board games, barbies, you name it. His drawers were stuffed full with candy and his mini-fridge only had soda in it. The only thing is - none of these things were for Big John. Book Rec: “Buried Memories” - by Katie Beers (Written by the victim of the crime - and how she recovered from such a traumatic event. Get your tissues ready) Full Source Notes: rottenmangopodcast.com To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Rambles. Whether you're doing a dance to your favorite artist in the office parking lot, or being guided into Warrior I in the break room before your shift, whether you're running on your Peloton tread at your mom's house while she watches the baby, or counting your breaths on the subway. Peloton is for all of us, wherever we are, whenever we need it, download the free Peloton app today. Peloton app available through free tier or pay to description starting at 12.99 per month. Ramble. Butterbeam Butterboo

Welcome to this week's main episode of Rotten Mango. I'm your host Stephanie Sue and I'm just going to drop you off in the middle of this crime. He had gotten to work. He had already built most of the underground bunker. He bought more Barbie dolls just in case. I mean, just in case he might need it for her. The 101 Dalmatians 90. Oh, that was, that was a good detail. That was perfect. But there was something that he was missing. I mean, yeah, the nine-year-old girl. But that was just a matter of time. You know, it's just a matter of time until he traps her in his bunker forever. No, no, no. There was something something else that was just itching at him, something that was missing. He had the coffin shaped box that she was going to stay in when he would go back upstairs and say hello to his neighbors, go outside, act like he's a completely normal person living

a completely normal life. Ah, he knew it. It was the head box, a completely soundproof box that allows no light to penetrate, complete darkness, that had just enough air to not suffocate the wearer. It would be too heavy, that the wearer could not even lift their neck up, and they would be completely trapped and completely helpless. They wouldn't even have any clue what was going on around them. If this sounds familiar, it probably

was familiar to him too, because there was a book that he had read on the case called the Perfect Victim about the kidnapping torture case of Colleen Stan. Now here was a man in his apartment hoping to recreate that, but with a nine-year-old girl, and the daughter of his family friend. As always, full source notes are available at rotinmancopodcasts.com, but we have a really, really, good book his family friend. 38 years old she's married she's got kids she's living her best life and she felt like you know when she's 26 It's time. She's ready to share the story with the world She remembered one of the reporters by the name of Carolyn and felt like out of all the reporters that covered her case decades ago Maybe she could trust this one to help share her story

So this is when the victim and the reporter they team up and they write this book I mean it's absolutely insane because they make such a good team. The book is so emotional. I highly recommend you read it because I don't think any coverage of this case comes anywhere near what that book does. It's a lot of raw emotions and it gives you a lot of insight on just how crimes really affect victims beyond just, oh, this is what happened. But really, what's the aftermath?

How do victims recover from their trauma? Can they live a normal life? What is that journey like? And we cover so many stories where we don't really get to see the rest of the victims' life and sometimes it's because the victim just wants privacy and you want to respect that but when you do see it it really just I mean it shows you that life can change at any moment. I think that's like the one takeaway from the book that just hit me so hard because if Katie Beers can go through what she went through and come out a strong woman, a strong mother, a strong wife, I mean, it's just, there's a lot. I'm gonna, I'm gonna start crying right now.

No, but it's really emotional. So go pick that book up because this is not a deep dive. But let's get into the story. So Katie's childhood, Katie Beers. She was born in Long Island in a place called a, like near May Stick Beach. So this is Suffolk County, which is also where Gabby Petito is from, side note. Now Katie's mom Marilyn wasn't really sure who Katie's biological dad is. She just, Marilyn was not the best mom. Can I say that she wasn't the best mom? That's for sure. She did try.

She worked a lot of different odd jobs to try to feed her kids. She was a taxi driver at one point. She honestly took any job that paid her some amount of money, but because she was so busy trying to put food on the table, trying to keep the lights on. She was never home. The house really wasn't taking care of. I mean, the house itself was in need of desperate repairs. Like it just wasn't a safe environment for kids. It was falling apart. They lived in this small garage converted into an apartment type unit. Their front door would have been open. Their front door was rotted shut. So how did they get out?

Through the back door. That's it. That's all they could use. But it's not like they taped it shut. It's not like they boarded it up. I mean, it was rotted shut. Their kitchen was always dirty filled with dirty dishes. I mean, Maryland just really did not have time to make this house a home and the two kids so Katie had

an older half brother by the name of John they were not well taken care of Katie was chronically absent from school they would move from random school districts to another school district she never really had like a stable place that she called home and it was so bad that none of the schools in the area ever really knew if she was a student. So you know how like your school records they transfer and if you don't show up to school certain amount of days you get a CPS worker or at least that's how it works in the United States.

But for them they're like we don't know. I just know she doesn't go here. They're like wait I thought she moved to that district. So nobody had any idea. Like what school she was attending because they moved that district. So nobody had any idea. Like what school she was attending because they moved that frequently. There was a time where CPS was called multiple times to the house actually. And when they went, Linda, who is Katie's godmother, not an actual relative, Maryland's best friend is Katie's godmother, would just come right now the house with a

slipper and hand hollering, chasing the case worker out of the property. NCPS is like, you know what, I checked it out, it's all good over there. So a lot of the times in the house, it was just Katie and her half-brother, John. Now he's six years older than hers. So I mean, it's not really like a best friend type of relationship, but he tries to be a protective older brother. But he's not that successful because he's still a kid. So Katie's childhood was just overall rough.

There's really no better way to describe it. She had been through a lot ever since the day she was born. It seemed like all of the adults in her life just were lining up so that they could fail this little girl. Like in a line, Katie didn't know her biological dad. Her mom was never home. She had a godmother, the mother figure named Linda, who Katie said was super abusive.

Now because Marilyn was super busy every day, she would say, hey, Katie, you're going to your Godmother's house. You're going to my best friend's house, okay? You're just gonna stay there. And Katie hated it. She said she was treated like a quote unquote slave. Constantly forced to do all these chores around the house. Sometimes if Katie didn't finish her chores for the day,

Linda would call her school tomorrow. Say, you know what? Katie can't make it. Oh, she's so sick. So that Katie could stay home and do Linda's chores. She did all these chores without a moment's rest. From the moment that she woke up, she had to make breakfast, do the dishes, clean the house, dust the shelves, and it wouldn't stop until it was time to sleep again. And this took place when Katie was only like four years old. This is when it started. A woman named Trudy worked at a local laundry mat where Katie would have to do Linda's laundry.

So they didn't even have a washer at home, so this little kid, this old five-year-old would walk to the laundry mat to do these adult's laundry. And she later told the president, I quote, Katie would come in with this little hand back of her change and sit right there. I'd help her with the wash. She would always have a big load. First for her mother, then for her godmother, I felt sorry for her. The kid used to drink coffee, and I used to ask her, Katie, why aren't you out there playing with your friends? Should I say, I don't have friends.

She tried it, okay, this lady was like, let me give you my two cents. She thought it was because the house was filthy. Katie's house was filthy, that's why she doesn't have friends. Now she's not necessarily wrong, okay, it's a little mean, but she's not necessarily wrong. Let me explain this whole house thing. Now Katie loved going to school. It was her safe place, right?

It was a one place where the adults in her life aren't present. She can actually depend on people, but because she only had these hand me downs typically from her older half brother that's six years older you know she wore summer clothes in the long island winter which is just freezing she wore outgrown pants all the time all of her clothes were either super worn out hand me downs or from the dollar store and barely from the dollar okay, she got one new piece of clothing every single year, which was just one shirt for picture day and she would wear it practically 300 days of the year until the next picture day.

So the kids at school, they didn't want to be her friend no matter how nice her sweet she was, they called her dirty Katie or cockroach kid. Now what made it worse is because she got a case of headlice. Did you know I got life's once? or cockroach kid. Know what made it worse is because she got a case of headlice. Did you know I got life's ones? It's really rough if you're like the origin because the schools don't make it easy. How did they find out?

I don't know, but the schools, they're like, okay, these little adult gossipers where I went to school, all the kids, all the parents would know who was the origin child for all of the headlice. And you were the origin? I was not, yeah. But they would find out and I'm like wait a minute this feels like it shit This is a hippo violation. No

Like this feels like some sort of medical knowledge She like this is just setting kids up for failure So she gets headlice and she's so embarrassed because everyone already thinks she's a dirty kid and now she has Lice this just proves it to them. She gets sent home to get treated and do they do it on a low-key way? Probably not. They're probably like Katie to the office for your lice over the intercom, you know So none of the adults care to do something about it when she gets home So when she goes back to school she tries not to itch because she's still got the lice Which is like I'm just gonna act like because no one would help her. I mean what's a five-year-old to do really?

So she acts like she didn't have the head ice, but then the nurse checks her and embarrasses her further. She's like, oh my god, your hair is still there! All the lights! Just pointing out that her hair is still full of lights. So the infection finally got so bad that Katie was forced to chop off all of her long hair. And she loved that long hair. She started wearing hats to try to cover up her short hair. She called it a quote unquote boy haircut. And kids are mean. They did not want to be her friend for those reasons. Now back to the abuse, OK?

Because it gets worse. Now if Katie didn't do what her mom said, or specifically more so, what Linda told her to do, she would get beat. She would get cursed at sometimes, even if she did everything Linda had asked her to do, she would still get cursed at. She would still get beat just because Linda felt like it.

Sometimes she would be guilt tripped, so you see, Linda had lost her leg to diabetes. So she used this as an excuse to boss Katie around and to make Katie feel like, why am I complaining? I can't complain. And at one point Aunt Linda had even put out a cigarette on Katie's arm in anger. So she's got this scar on her arm. And now you're thinking, where is her freaking mom? I get it. She's working. She's a single mom. She's working multiple jobs. But like at that point, you got to protect your kid. But when Linda and Marilyn were

together, it was even worse. They just brought out the worst to each other. Like, you know, those best friends, I don't know how they're still friends, but they just keep egging each other on and it seems more like they hate each other than they have fun with each other, so they would look at Katie and they noticed that she's got a pimple on her cheek. Something's on her cheek. What is that? A warrant? And together, they just kept popping it.

They'd sit little Katie down and they would just take turns popping her little blemish. They would put salicylic acid on it while it was still pretty much an open sore like a gaping hole essentially which is incredibly painful if you've ever done that. They kept squeezing it till it bled until it bled until it bled and it resulted in what Katie called to be a quote unquote hole in her cheek. But that wasn't all. Linda and Marilyn were always fighting. There was an instance where they had such a heated fight that the two women started throwing

Fernatrat each other in front of the children. And it was all about who's going to be Katie's mom. It was so bad that the police were called. They want to be or they don't want to be. I know it's bizarre. Okay. So the police get called and they try to calm them down. explain to us ladies like what's going on? Why are you guys so referring to each other? Why are the children crying? Ellen is like listen, Katie's my daughter. My daughter I tell you because Marilyn, her so-called mom, had dropped her off at my house when Katie was just a baby, just an infant. And then Marilyn, what did you do? You disappeared for months and I took care of her. I took care of her, so I want full custody of her.

Give her to me. Now, Marilyn, she argued the exact opposite. She said, are you forking kidding me? You refused to give my daughter back after babysitting. For months, I should have called the cops. I should have, but I didn't, because you were my best friend. Just both of them. Yep, and then they would turn around

and they'd say, Katie, sweetie, tell the nice police officer who you love more It's tell them who you want to be your mommy and So even with all of this tumultuous fighting Katie still spent a lot of time with both women She still had to go to Linda's house to her god-mom slash second-mom's house who only lived 30 minutes away Because Marilyn was always busy with work and it wasn't just that. It wasn't just this instability. It wasn't just this hecticness, this neglect. It was the fact that the neighbors suspected that Katie was being sexually abused. What?

So this, it doesn't seem like a wild conspiracy. This, for this instance, doesn't seem like the neighbors are just, you know, running with crazy little rumors because Sal and Jaleri, his name is Sal, is Linda's husband, had confessed to the police that he had molested Katie. He was facing first-degree sexual abuse charges, he was arrested, and due to appearing court soon, and he was banned from having any contact with Katie. When was this? The assault started when Katie was only two to three years old. Not only was she too young to realize what was going on, but she was too young to even articulate into sentences what was happening to her, let alone understand it.

So the story all starts around the time that Katie moved in with her grandma, Helen. Now, this is Marilyn's mom. So they all move in together. Marilyn, Helen's daughter, and the two grandkids. They move into her house and Marilyn's just saying, listen, mom, I've got the kids grandkids. They move into our house, and Marilyn's just saying, listen mom, I've got the kids with me, I need to make up money, I need to make some money to get back on my feet, we got evicted,

I just need a place to stay. So grandma, Helen, I mean, she's like really softy. She's like one of the nicest people you'll meet. So she's like, of course, of course, yes, bring the kids. I can give up my room, they can stay in the kid, like they can stay in my room, we'll make it work. Now this is like the best time Katie ever had. There was so much stability, Helen was so soft-spoken, so gentle She was the only person that really ever hugged Katie or physically expressed love with her, you know? And Marilyn, she just wasn't around even when they moved in with grandma because she's always out working

But then one day that piece is shattered when there's a knock on the door. Linda and her husband, Sal, showed up with their backs. Listen, Marilyn, I can explain. Please, please, please. Can we just stay here with your mom for a little while? And you guys, because we've been evicted. And we just need a week or two to get paid. And then we're going to use that money, our paycheck, to put a down payment on a new rental. And please, we'll be gone in a week. I swear. So grandma Helen, being the soft woman that she was, she was like, oh yeah, I've known you for years. Come on in Linda. Come on in, Linda's husband, Sal. Let's get your room.

So this was before all the babysitting happened. This was like in the mix of all of it. Yeah, so the only problem is, they never really planned on moving out. Linda and Cell, they never really planned on getting a new place or even getting a new job. They smelled weakness in Helen. You know those people that can just sniff that out? They smelled weakness in Helen,

they wanted to take advantage of it. They thought that they could run this house, and if anything, they wanted to take the house and take Helen's money. Oh my goodness. Their best friend's mom, okay. So Linda wasn't working, she was getting disability checks, Sal stopped working because he had a heart attack recently, and because of these new guests moving in, Katie didn't have her own room anymore. Linda and Sal were to sleep in the bed that she used to sleep in, and she was forced to sleep on the couch that was in that room So she's essentially sharing the same room as Linda and Sal

Which I mean I guess when you're like two to three and you really trust these people I guess it's not that alarming. I guess I mean I feel like nowadays nowadays. I'm like my kid is not sleeping anywhere Okay, now Linda's Sal, was a terrifying person. Katie remembers that he was just so overweight. And I think that this is important because Katie was so small. And when you hear the way that Sal acted with her, him being on the larger side made her feel even more helpless.

Okay, so this is kind of pertinent later. Now, he was constantly getting violent with Katie and little John. If they did anything even remotely wrong, he would beat them up, he would yell at them. Sometimes the couple would take the kids to the grocery store. I don't get these people that go out of their way to take care of kids that are not theirs and then abuse them at the same time. It's like, why don't you just leave the kids at home? They're not even your kids. So sometimes the couple would take the kids to the grocery store and they'd be looking around the aisles. Linda's favorite thing, where the grocery store cakes called yodels. I've never had them, but apparently they're really good.

And she'd be looking for her yodels. Down one aisle, another one. No, another one. No. The whole store, down out of yodels. She's pissed. So what did she do? She drags the kids back home and beats them up. Because she didn't get her yodels today. She's thinking to herself, well if we got there an hour early, if you didn't take your time walking to the car and you know spend another two seconds, if we got there two seconds early, maybe I would have gotten a yodel. And then when little John was young, he was kicked hard in the stomach by cell. Like a full grown man kicked him in the stomach because he didn't mow the lawn. This little kid.

If Katie got on his nerves, he would dangle her up against the wall with her feet dangling, get straight into her face and start yelling at her verbally threatening her. I mean, these kids were terrified. And this is how evil they are. So when I've Katie's strongest memories during this time was when Linda and Sal's friends would come over. Now, these friends, they were just annoyed that there were kids in the house. Even though they're the guests. It's not even their house.

That's what I'm saying. Super bizarre. So Sal gets offended for the kids, for the friends. He's like, you're right. How dare these kids exist in their own grandma's house. How dare they? How dare they be in our presence? And he locked Katie in the kitchen pantry, refused to letter out for hours. Linda and Sally even went to the movies with their friends.

Birds of a, what do you call it? Birds of a feather flock together. Like they're all, like the really shitty people. They locked her in the kitchen pantry, kept her in there when they finally Come home to light Katie out. She had peed all over the floor Because she had nowhere else to go and they beat her up for it and Then the sexual abuse started

So Sal started taking advantage of the fact that Katie was left on the couch unsupervised at night without her own room He would come in in the middle of the night and into the room when Linda was asleep, literally on the bed next to them, and he would slide into the couch and start molesting her. He would masturbate on her, he would like rub up against her, and I mean, she was terrified, she's like three, okay?

She's too terrified to do anything. Who would she even tell her mom? That's never home. Who? Linda, who would never take her side, would take her husband's side Helen I mean her grandma and she's she's wonderful she loved Katie to the moon and back but she was such a soft woman she was even being taken advantage of by cell she literally Katie had seen Linda and cell hit Helen so the only thing that she could do was

try to sleep in grandma's room every single night with Sal would come in and the oddly say in front of everyone, aw, Katie, well why don't we hang out first? Why don't you come and play with me before bed? Like let's just hang out. And then he would get close to her ear and whisper horrendous threats. If you don't freaking get up right now, like I'm gonna blah blah blah blah blah. So she starts getting more terrified, more traumatized,

Sal starts getting more brave, and as time goes on because he hadn't been caught, he starts taking it a step further, and further, until he was raping her. And she tried to do whatever she could to try to protect herself. She would even pretend to fall asleep while she was being assaulted because she thought, well maybe Sal would get bored, maybe he'll just leave. But he never did. He would force her into the bathroom after he finished his assault and he would tell her to clean up and he would watch her do it. Now up until this point the assaults mainly happened that night, but then he started getting

more ballsy. He started assaulting her during the day when everyone was awake. He would call Katie into his room, he would be waiting for her, half naked, and he would tell her, and I quote, play with me. And she remembered that he had, okay, this is the part of the book that I was absolutely just hysterically crying. So she remembered that he had this giant bottle of luberderm near his bed, which is a brand of lotion, and she would sneak into his room, and he wasn't there, so she's thinking, well if I throw this away, maybe if he doesn't have this lotion, he can't rape me. But every time she threw the bottle away, a new bottle would appear, and every time she saw the new bottle sitting on the nightstand, she would ball her eyes out. By this point she's seven years old getting raped at least once a week, if not more,

because Sal would even force her out of the house to run errands with him, like abuse her in his car, and he would drive her on till he finds like a private secluded spot for them to quote unquote, be alone. He would even force her to watch pornography with him so that she could quote-unquote learn to do the things that she saw on the videos to him. Now Linda is not any better. Linda actually did some sexually abusive things to Katie as well. Like I'm not sure if she knew about Sal being abusive because any time Katie tried to Linda about the abuse, Linda called her and I quote, a little rotten liar.

Why would you break into these apartments? For money, for drugs, whatever was in them. Why aren't you afraid of getting caught at doing this? No, who's going to catch us? What a police. It was the height of the crack era, and instead of locking up drug dealers, some New York City cops had become them. I would suit up in my uniform and we're going to want some drug dealers, and I know how to do it really well.

This is the inside story of the biggest police corruption scandal in NYPD history and the investigation that uncovered it all. Did you consider yourself a rat? 100%. I saved my soul just like everybody else does. Listen to and follow the set, an Odyssey originals documentary podcast series, available now in the Odyssey app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your shows. I'm not a big guy man, but I love being a dirty mother f***er. podcasts or wherever you get your shows. So Linda would also force Katie to watch porn with her while Linda would touch herself

What Linda would also lay next to Katie while she called these sex hotlines practically every night and would talk to them seductively And Linda would tell the operator I'm sleeping next to a little girl. So then these men Okay, this is gonna make you really lose hope in the world. These men would then demand to hear the little girl's voice So she'd wake Katie up who by the way has not fallen asleep because she's terrified And so she'd act like she's asleep and she'd be like, hey, they wake up wake up. He wants to talk to you. I don't want to talk to him. We have to. Hey, tell them this. Hi, this is Tinkerbell. Say that. So she'd be forced to say, hi, this is Tinkerbell.

Now imagine like a five year old saying that like a seven year old. It's like really creepy. This whole context is really disgusting. And illegal. Now this is traumatic. Katie starts bawling her eyes out. I mean she's being abused by practically every adult in her life whether it's neglect, whether it's sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse, and Linda would even yell at

her for embarrassing her on the phone with the sex phone operator. So Katie eventually tried to tell people that she's being abused, but Linda would call everyone. That Katie had told him, you know what? Kids are just rotten liars these days, and she's one of them. Don't believe in where she says. Katie tried telling her older brother, John. Now, she says that this is the only good guy that she had ever met is her older

brother John. And when she told him, he started getting teary eyed and he told her, it's okay, I'm gonna help you. I'm gonna spy on Sal through the window. I'm gonna catch him in the act and I'm gonna call the cops. If we catch him, he can't deny it. The problem was that Sal caught John's buying through the window. And he ran outside, beat John to a bloody pulp, and John managed to escape, ran straight to the police station, and said, look, isn't this proof I've been beaten because I caught

him molesting my sister? And when the police show up to the house, the question Sal, he denies everything. Oh, you know, John, he's just in his rebellious face. You know teenagers these days, Sal forces Katie to lie. So she says, yeah, nothing happened. And after that, she learned never to confide in anyone because it will only cause them and her more harm. Now, there was an instance where CPS did try to intervene very momentarily. Okay. So Sal wanted to abuse any young girl he could get near. It didn't even, it didn't matter. Nothing mattered to him.

He was just, he was a pervert. He was a pedophile. He needed to be, he needed to go to jail for sure. So when Katie invites one of her friends, Rosy Ann, over, he tries to rape this young girl, Rosy Ann. So she screams, runs all the way home, tells her parents exactly what happened. They call CPS on the family, but really the only thing that came out of that whole incident of CPS showing up questioning everyone was that Katie was no longer allowed to play with Rosian.

That's it. That was like the, that was the great result. So really, who's on Katie's side right now? It wasn't even an option to tell Grandma because she's being bullied by Sal too. So Helen's being beat up, Helen's being forced to try to sign over the over the house deed and title to Sal and Linda.

She refuses, but somehow Sal convinces her to take a $50,000 equity loan on the house and lend him half of it, $25,000 in cash. What the? And after she does, he still wants her to sign over the house in his name. She thought that that would all end. So she refuses and doesn't really know how to say no, so instead she stops making the

payments on the house and the loan. And eventually, the house goes into foreclosure. Now this is how this blit happens. Marilyn takes her kids to a broken-down house in Mastic Beach, Linda and Sal to their own place about 30 minutes away from the family, but Katie and John were still again forced to visit their place all the time. So now that the split has happened, one day, Marilyn's working her shift as a taxi driver. She picks up a woman by the name of Rose.

They're having a pleasant conversation and Rose keeps telling Marilyn, you know, you really have to meet my son, you know? He's great, all he's great. He's part of the Big Brothers program. Have you heard of that? Yeah, yeah, so it's a prominent and like low-income single-parent household. It matches young kids around six to 18 years old with someone in the community, an adult. That's maybe around 20, 34 years old, and there's requirements. Of course, you've got to do background checks, you have to have a college degree but I mean it's beneficial so if you're a single mom you've got to sit in the house maybe they need a father figure maybe they

need they need a man to talk to about things that they wouldn't feel comfortable talking to their mom about and the adult volunteers are supposed to help guide the kids in the right direction encourage them to study make a choice and once you get matched in the system you would generally call each other big and littles kind of like sorority and fraternity lingua right now Marilyn was intrigued she had always been worried about her son John because there was no father figure in the house she was busy with work she didn't know how to raise him so well maybe this makes sense Maybe I need someone to get, hey Rose, do you mind giving me your son's number?

Thank you so much. This might be perfect. So we find out that Rose's son is John Espicido. Now, we're gonna call him Big John for the rest of this video, okay? Because that's what the family called him. And then Marilyn's son is John. So they called him Little John and Big John. Okay, got it. Right, so through Big John's mom she gets his information and reaches out to see if they can set up a meeting. The whole problem with this is that she didn't go through the Big Brother

program. She actually just kind of just called him up and was like, hey, can we come over or can you want to come over? You want to meet at a coffee shop? Because if she had gone through the program itself, she would have found out that John Espicito was not actually accepted into the program. He had failed the screening test because he had a criminal background of trying to kidnap a 12-year-old kid from a parking lot. Now, I do think that he also lied to his mom Rose. Okay, so I'm not trying to say that his mom was like an accomplice. I genuinely think that she believed that her son could do no wrong and that he was a big brother in this program.

So from that point on, Marilyn just starts dropping off her son who's about 16 at the time, and to Big John's house, just to play games, play video games, literally hang out with each other. Eventually when Katie was like eight years old, she starts going to see Big John, she was dropped off with her brother, and she liked him. You know, whenever they would hang out, he had a new toy for her, typically a Barbie doll. How old is Big John? In his 40s.

Oh my god. Big John, yeah. He was always super sweet with her, gave her these big hugs, but then he slowly started to freak her out a little. I mean, it's going on for a while, but Big John really became just integrated into the beer's life as a family friend. To one day, Marilyn the mom is informed. And it's not really clear how she found out if maybe Little John told her if she had heard

from someone else, but she finds out that Big John had touched Little John in a quote-unquote bad way. So immediately she takes action, the kids were no longer allowed. They were forbidden to see Big John and Katie was relieved, okay? Because Big John lived closer to Linda's place. A lot closer. And every time Katie would go to Linda's place, her instincts were going off that this adult was just weird.

John would call Linda's place at the same time that Linda took her every single day without fail routine, daytime nap. Linda's asleep. Same time every day. John would call up the house, Katie would pick it up and whisper into Katie's ears, Hey, why don't you come meet me outside? Sneak out of the house, I can pick you up. No, no, but don't wake up, Linda. Don't tell Linda, because she's jealous of our relationship, you know? I just want to sneak you away to play video games at my house. And every time Katie declined, because she's like, no,, you know? I just want to sneak you away to play video games at my house.

And every time Katie declined, because she's like, no, I'm going to get in trouble. That's weird. So who the hell is this shady John character? John Espicito. He was born in New York to his mom Rose. Now Rose was ecstatic when she had John, because she had just lost her son who passed away.

John was her gift. This was her special boy. She called all the time completely. My son, my son, my boy, my boy, I mean, truly like that. An in turn, he became like this supreme ruler of the house essentially. Like, he ran that shit. John would even later live in his mom's garage well into his 30s and 40s. He had converted the garage into his own apartment, a two floor apartment.

On the downstairs level, he had a kitchen and a living room. And upstairs, he had a bedroom, which was pretty much just filled to the brim with games. It was more of a game room with a mattress, honestly, and the walk-in closet that he had was wall-to-wall with the newest and latest games. You name it, Nintendo, board games, monopoly, mind you. This is a man in his 40s.

I'm not saying you can't play games in your 40s, but it just didn't seem like it was his passion Are you catching my drift? Oh for kids? He had it and the neighborhood kids loved him for it Not only did he let them come over to play his games He would always tell them my door is always open to you whenever you want That is so freaky. He always kept candy in his bedroom.

His mini fridge was stocked with sodas. This was every kid's dream. And a lot of single parents and single moms dream at the time because, I mean, this was a different time period where parents were a lot more trusting, right? Now, big John was well loved in the neighborhood. He was almost seen as a saint. Because he took care of the kids,

he played with them, he watched them, and he was a decent guy. Or so they thought, they thought he was mentoring them. Now, all of this is made more alarming by the fact that John had a shady criminal history. Like, I had said, he was arrested for trying to pull a 12 year old boy into his car at the parking lot of a shopping mall.

A stranger boy, does that make sense? No, because John had pled guilty to a lesser charge, his court documents were sealed. So the general public would not know, but this is something that the Big Brother's program found out, and that's why his application was denied. And the fact that you apply for that, you can only imagine. I mean, what is going through this person's mind? What is he trying to accomplish from the big brothers program so two years before the kidnapping john had lost his mom his older brother and they had passed away

just months apart from each other so this is after he's already a family friend of the beers uh-huh so he has these two big life events i mean he was seen crying hysterically sobbing at his mom's funeral but i I mean, does I really justify anything? No, it doesn't. So, December 26, the day after Christmas rolls around. This is just four days before Katie's 10th birthday. She's so excited. I mean, can you imagine, like, you're hitting the double digits, you're grown now, you're like a big kid, and there was a knock on the door of Maryland's house. And it was Anne Butler, and you're thinking who the hell is Anne? Anne is Linda's mom.

Okay, she's knocking on the door. Begging, Maryland, please! Can we just take Katie for a couple days for her 10th birthday? Listen, Linda spent weeks planning this big, big, big birthday party. She misses her so much and I'm sure Katie misses her too. And Maryland's like yeah Absolutely not. I don't want my daughter Katie anywhere near sell or even big John because I know big John lives in that area and Linda's pretty close with big John. No, I don't really think so

But I can't beg. Oh please honey. I mean we've got this whole party plan for her. We invited the whole family Oh, please, honey, I mean, we've got this whole party plan for her. We invited the whole family. Sal's not gonna be there. I assure you, we won't let our talk to Big John. It'll mean the world to Linda. So, Marilyn says, okay, okay. But I want her home for an actual birthday. Okay, just take her for like two days.

Marilyn turns to Cadience as you listen to me, okay? If you at any point while you're with Linda, you even get a glimpse of Sal or a big John. They even set foot near Linda's house. You need to call the police immediately. Okay? You're not going to get in trouble. Just do that. So Ann, Linda's mom takes Katie to Linda's and the next state December 27, Linda does have a big birthday party that she did prepare for Katie. Her whole family came over, they all celebrated, it was all going okay until Big John showed up. With a massive present for Katie, her very own Barbie doll dream house. But Katie, here's a problem, okay? Big John told her he was a problem Katie. I need to come over tomorrow and I need to help set it up. You know it's complicated

You don't know how to set it up. I got to do that for you. That's for adults Now Katie doesn't really say anything She's like mm-hmm okay, then she rushes to Linda. Hello wait I thought I wasn't supposed to see him remember my mom told me to call the police remember oh It's fine. He's a nice person. You know how your mom likes to exaggerate. He's coming over tomorrow, and we're just not gonna tell your mom, okay? The party goes according to plan. They go to sleep then the next morning rolls around December 28th. John sure enough comes over knocking on the door time to set up that Barbie dream house and afterwards he casually asked Linda Hey, do you mind if I take Katie off your hands for a couple hours? I want to try to take her to spaceplex.

So spaceplex is this indoor amusement park with arcade games. Think Dave and Buster's. I want to take her there. Yeah, sure, sure, John, whatever you want. Katie whips her head around and is looking at Linda. Like, are you kidding me? Him coming over to your house when your home is one thing. Him taking me out. My mom's going to kill me. Did you bump your head? How do you not remember this? I gotta call the cops

Katie it's okay. Yeah, he's just taking you to spaceplex You're gonna be home in a couple hours and we won't tell your mom So off with big John Katie is essentially forced go, and she said that she had this sick feeling, and it was the same feeling whenever Sal would come onto the couch in the middle of the night. But because they had a restraining order on Sal, Big John did not have a restraining order, and young ten-year-olds Katie's mind. She probably felt like that meant the police wouldn't do anything.

They wouldn't really care. And with all of the abuse that she had endured with Linda and Sal, I mean, there was really no way that she could actually call the police. So she went with John very reluctantly, and she said it felt like a weird date. She was sitting in the front seat of his pickup truck. She was only, you know, almost 10. Didn't even have her seat belt on. Like the cool adult he is.

He would, during the car ride, convince her to come scoot over, sit on his lap so that she could steer the car by herself. Well, what about we stop at Toys or Us before we go to Spaceplex? How does that sound, Katie? And she instantly had a bad feeling. She starts getting nervous because that's the other way from Spaceplex. The Spaceplex, SpaceX, I said. Okay?

Because Spaceplex, she knows where it is. They pass by it all the time. You're a kid. You know exactly where you're like, mom, I want to go here, right? Toys are us is near his house. So she starts getting worried, but he drives straight to Toys are us, buys her a Barbie, and afterwards, drives straight into his neighborhood and parks in his driveway, without even telling her what's happening. Why don't you just come into my bedroom and we can play some Nintendo?

She walks in, no Now she's worried because usually there's a ton of people there. At least roll to brother, at least other kids. Sometimes big John's sister was living in the house, maybe not the garage, but the house. But nobody was there. No cars. Complete silence. Okay, it's gonna be okay. She's a kid. She's like, I just need to get through this and it's gonna be fine. So she starts playing a couple of games in his bedroom and when he comes back, Katie said that he just wasn't the same anymore. This just was not the same John. He had left her alone in his bed, you know, for like a couple of, I want to say like an hour. And now he is back. He's not wearing his baseball cap that he had never been seen without.

And there was just something about his face, something was different. He turns off the lights, closes the curtains, and he comes up behind her and he starts touching her, and he says, I'm not going to hurt you, Katie. And then he covered her mouth with his hand, pulled her onto his lap, and assaulted her. Now the saddest part is that Katie, who was just 9 years old at the time, she said that she was so used to being assaulted, that she almost thought to herself, well what's the point of trying to stop him. After the assault, John picks her up and starts to carry her to the downstairs of his garage

apartment. Now she knew that this was only going to get worse because kids were generally not allowed downstairs. They were only allowed upstairs to eat candy and play video games in his bedroom. She starts kicking, fighting, screaming, crying, but nothing is stopping him. He drops her onto the floor of his office that she had never seen before, and on one side of the wall was this massive wooden bookcase. He had hung up all of his baseball caps on these little hooks without talking to her, without responding to her.

He starts unscrewing all the hooks for his baseball caps and he starts tugging, tugging on that big wooden bookshelf. And she sees the middle section start sliding out on wheels. Oh my god. And it was now in the middle of the office and it had revealed behind the bookcase wasn't a wall, but a small rectangular hole. Now this hole is not like an elevator shaft, okay? It's a small hole. Maybe you put a small safe, but inside that hole. On the ground, what looked, if you just looked at it, looked like a concrete, you wouldn't

even know. But if you were able to lift up that concrete slab, it would lead to a tunnel. So even if you were able to get this bookcase out and you saw this rectangular hole, you would never think that it leads to another hole. It just looks like a place where people would storage valuables. So John, without saying anything, just goes straight to work. He starts trying to lift up that concrete slab. He has to get rid of the rug first.

There's like a little lever that he's working with. So he's got a whole system in place. It's not just him, you know, brute force moving a slab of concrete. And slowly he's revealing a tunnel. So she starts panicking. I mean she's like, okay, this is my last chance to try and get help because she's nine. She's smart. So while John is distracted, she sees a phone sitting on his desk. She jumps to it, crawls under the desk with the phone, dials 911, and all she was able to say was, I'm on Saxon Avenue. Before John heard her, ran to her, clicked the phone off, and threw her up against a wall.

Now, this wall was a rectangular hole. And there were a lot of exposed nails because there was a lot of construction. So her whole back, I mean, it was just bleeding. She starts crying hysterically. There's blood dripping down her back, and John just continues to scream at her. Don't ever touch that phone again. And finally, he removes the concrete slab from the hole on the ground.

Looks at her coldly and tells her, get down the fucking hole. I don't want to. What's down there? A bomb shelter. And he picks her up and throws her down feet first. So she's in this little tunnel, she honestly said that she felt like Alice down the rabbit hole. It was dark, she felt like she was falling forever, she knew that she would be there forever.

She starts crawling, and he's coming down the hole behind her. Once I get to the end of the tunnel, she sees a room. She's in this room now. In the middle of the room is the most alarming part, something probably that made Katie's blood run cold. A small wooden box, the size of a coffin, padlocked shut. And in the corner of her room, there was a toilet, but it was not attached to any piping, but instead there was just a black trash bag lining it.

There were two shelves in the room. One of them had a security monitor on it that showed the outside of John's house. So he could see if anyone was coming home. And the entirety of the room was like soundproof with what like cushions and egg cartons. So she's busy scanning the room and John opens up the coffin size box, get in! And she looked inside, there's a small little mattress like a camping mattress, a pillow, some sheets, and a TV. And a 101 Dalmatians Night Gown. So she's gonna be in like a dog cage essentially. So she has enough room to kind of sit up and lay down but not stand. And so she looks at the box, and he opened and looks at him and says, have you been planning to kidnap me? Yes, for a while now. When am I going to go

home? This, this is your new home. You're going to live here. And then he put a tape recorder in her hands and told her that she needed to record a tape for her. Repeat these exact words. I've been kidnapped by a man with a knife. Oh, and here he comes now. Practice it. Come on, Katie, practice. No, no, no, you need more emotion. Ah, maybe you're more comfortable if you do it alone.

So John leaves the room and Katie's alone with a tape recorder, so she's smart, okay? She's sitting there reciting the words that he told her. I've been kidnapped by a man with a knife and here he comes. But at the end, after a long pause she says, big John has me, he has me at his house, and clicks it off. Now when he comes back to fetch the tape, instead of mailing it off, he starts to play it right in front of her.

Wait until the end, heard the long pause, and then he heard Katie whisper. And without any warning, he slapped her across the face. And forced her to redo it. Now John was a smart cookie. A result of being a mama's boy, right? Maybe he thought that he was a smart cookie. He had an airtight masterful plan in his mind. He was going to drive to spaceplex, pretending that he came in with Katie. The amusement park that he told Linda he was taking her to, but he would also pretend that he had lost her inside.

Some man probably took her out of there, so he called Aunt Linda's house, played the recording of Katie's into Linda's messages. Some man took me with a knife, you know? Hopefully this will derail the whole investigation. And it kinda did. Reporters start swarming the houses of Maryland and Linda to get some good interviews. Oh my god, a girl gets kidnapped with a man with a knife at spaceplex, the local amusement park. We gotta do something about it!

Linda would invite these reporters and she would sit on her dining tables, chain smoking, playing a whole new world on repeat. Because she claimed to this was Katie's favorite song that was a VIE. And she would say, what I heard the tape, I knew that Katie was crying hysterically and I couldn't believe it. I was hearing her talking about a man with a knife. I had to listen to it ten times to figure out it was real. So she's playing it up for the press. Marilyn, she said, I felt like I was going crazy every time the phone rings I jump. And even while Katie was missing, the two women were fighting. Linda created a fake room in her house that was Guadalajuan's

Katie's room. She filled it to the brim with toys, looked straight out of a Disney catalog, but it was all a lie. Katie didn't have her own room. Katie didn't have toys. And then what do you know? While the press is at Linda's house, she finds a construction paper. You know, construction paper, like the kids play with, a letter from Katie to her. And in childish handwriting, it said, to Aunt Linda, I love you. You are my favorite person in the world, but I am stuck in the middle of you in Maryland. I love you

both, but I love you more than Maryland. You and I have a lot of good memories to share, but you gotta understand that I'm only 10 years old. So it's very hard for me to decide who I want to live with because I have, I lived with both of you. Love always, Catherine. P.S., I love you. These people are so busy. Doing nothing. Being just a nuisance and hindering investigations.

Yeah. Now Marilyn claims to the press that she believed that the letter was fake because my daughter would never refer to me as Marilyn. She called me Mommy and she also did not prefer Linda as a mother figure. She doesn't even look like her handwriting. She also wouldn't sign her name as Catherine. She would say it's Katie. So the two moms in Katie's life, they couldn't even come together at a time like this. They even interviewed Sal. Linda has been. The god dad. And he said, I don't know who could hurt a little girl. Oh my god. And the press asked her, well, do you have any doubts about the sincerity of Katie's mother Marilyn? And he said, oh, yeah, she's a total phony. Anyone can see past

those tears. So you think Katie's mom Marilyn is not actually distraught and upset? No, I know this girl for a long time. I know her inside and out like a book. And those are phony tears. But why the, why is that? Why would she be crying phony tears? Why?

Maybe she got a sick mind. I don't know. She abandoned the kid when she was only two months old, you know, my wife. She didn't even raise the child, she didn't want to raise the child. But you know, they answered to what happened to Katie, now that lies in Maystick Beach, okay, either Marilyn or Little John know where Katie is. Because you know, Marilyn, she was into that stuff, you know? Uh, rituals, voodoo, witchcraft? Yeah. Real rich coming from this guy, okay?

So he's trying to tell the press that Marilyn, or Little John, knows something about it. Marilyn loves witchcraft. So they had something to do with Katie's disappearance. So of course, instantly, the press is doing this. They're doing their rounds of trying to get there, you know? Trying to get these interviews. And the first suspect for the police has always been John, as Especido, the last one to be seen with her. He claimed that he gave her some cash at spaceplex.

She was walking towards a vending machine to get something and he sat down waiting for her, but she never came back. All within the inside of like a DMV, not a DMV, a David Buster, sorry. That's strange. She still hasn't come back. He decides to check up on her. Couldn't find her anywhere. Now the police could confirm that some people had seen John at spaceplex.

But nobody saw John with Katie. Nobody even saw Katie at all at spaceplex. So the police asked both John, what do you think happened to Katie? I don't know, something dirty, so they let him go. And he goes back into the bunker and Katie said it was the good John again, the one that she had known all these years. So I think that I don't think that anyone thought that John had DID, but I think it's like when you're nine, you don't realize that all of these adults can have such different sides of them, like a side

that they showed to the world and the side that they don't show to the world. And so she had just seen the good John. He was nice, he was asking, are you comfortable? Do you need anything? And so she asked for a blanket, there's no heater down there. It's December in the Northeast. And while he went to grab a blanket, she was not in the coffin. She was just in the room. She saw the security monitor looking into John's driveway and there were a set of keys next to the monitor.

She tried to reach for it but she was too short, so she tried jumping. That didn't work. She finds a milk crate, sets it up upside down, and goes on top to grab the set of keys. She quickly stuffed them under her pillow and when he came back with a blanket, he asked her a terrifying question. Have you ever had sex before? Now, Katie reluctantly kind of told him that she had been abused by Sal, and she instantly regretted it because John was smiling. He seemed excited that Katie had been abused. And he said, oh, so you're experienced! And before he raped her, he wanted her to change into the 101 Dalmatians night count. And then after the assault, he asked her to get naked so

he can take a picture of her laying on the ground pretending to be asleep and she asked why. And he said because if they think you're dead they're going to stop looking for you. So she, I mean she was terrified, she was like well then eventually you're probably going to kill me no, what do you mean no one's going to look for me. So she said no I can't do that right now like I can't. And no all right kid, well we'll do it next time if you're not up for it. So since that incident she was on on edge, she couldn't sleep. She felt like he was gonna come and kill her any day now.

John would visit Katie at least once a day, or so she thought she would really have a time, you know, a feeling for time, that is. But she knew that each day that the door opened, it was a risky game. It was either gonna be mean sadistic John who would violently assault her, or it was nice John, who was gonna bring her her a Barbie or a blanket. But sometimes he would swap right in front of her. He'd be nice big John would bring her juice and toys and then he would violently assault her.

And the whole time Katie said that she just couldn't resist, okay. She felt like she felt like fighting back would make it more fun for someone like him So she just wanted him to be bored of her Does that make sense like leave her alone? Just if you lay there it's gonna be over as quickly as possible. She was just disgusted Then one day Katie looks at the security monitor on the screen and her heart stops on the monitor. she sees a police car in the driveway. She starts screaming, I'm downstairs, I'm in the office, she starts screaming down here, please help me, help me, I'm here, please. She, by the end of the shed, lost her voice and collapsed from exhaustion

and the police, she watched them on the camera, get back into their cars and drive off. And in that moment, she knew that she would be the only one that could count on herself to get out of there So she starts pressuring John. What about school? How am I gonna learn things, huh? Katie, I'm gonna keep you in here forever until people forget about you which they will they'll forget But what about my life? What about my future? What about getting married having children? Well, you can marry me and you can have children with me. You don't have to go to college because I'll take care of you, Katie. I will, forever.

He claims that he loves her and that's why you're here. I took you to protect you. And she's like, what? Well, I'll teach you everything you need to know. You don't need anyone else. I'm the only friend you ever need, Katie. Listen, Katie, when you turn 18 years old, I'm going to give you my car, my Camaro. And every day that you're down here, I'm going to give you $100. By the time you get out, you're going to be stinking rich. And it continued to keep her down there. Her entire diet was candy and junk food.

And on special occasions, John would bring down a quote-unquote meal, but it was always just microwave mac and cheese and hamburger. But the worst part is, it wasn't even the lack of nutrition. It was the fact that Katie was so terrified that the food was poisoned, she refused to eat anything that was opened. Only the unopened packaged things she would even inspect it. And she said the worst was the after-meal mints. I guess she couldn't brush her teeth. So you just give her these mints and she said that it just, it made her gag. It had this bitter aftertaste that was disgusting.

But the most dehumanizing part of this ordeal she claimed in the book, you gotta read this book. Some of the most vivid memories that she had was that when she needed to use a toilet, there was one in the room, but not in her coffin-sized box. She did have the key to get out of this coffin box, but she knew if she freed herself to use the toilet, he would know that she had the key. So she would consciously make a choice

instead of controlling, you know, getting out, peeing, pooping, and going back in, she would have to pee and poop in her little box that had practically no air ventilation. She said the smell of that tiny little coffin box was so putrid she couldn't escape. Even after they cleaned it, the smell would linger and it would only guess worse every day and it felt like this constant reminder of the shame and humiliation that she felt, and even to this day, Katie always has to have a bathroom nearby. Now nobody is really clear why John did this next, okay, but the police kind of have an idea that maybe it was Katie. It seemed like Katie had saved herself. Katie kept telling John that she was feeling sick. She felt like something was wrong with her body. She was going to die soon.

He needed to get her to a hospital. He needed to let her out. Otherwise, he's gonna have a dead body on his hands. She would never tell on him because she loves him. They found recordings of this because John had recorded some of their sessions. Some of the assaults and some of the conversations. And they think that this is why on January 13th, John walked into his attorney's office and said, one sentence that changed everything. I know where that girl Katie is, because at this point, there were massive manhunts for Katie. How long has it been?

It's been from the 27th to the 13th, 27th of December to the 13th of January. 17th. Yeah. The attorney said what? Is she alive? Yes. I have her an underground bunker holding her captive, but yes, she has a life. So from then on, I mean, I mean, it was an absolute chaos. The attorney gets the police involved, the press get involved, the information is leaked to the media, all the reporters journalists, they start staking out outside of Jon's house. They had no idea that Katie was trapped almost directly underneath them in a coffin-shaped box. So, she gets woken up, not by the chaos upstairs, but by Jon coming down to the bunker and she thought it was strange because she was now getting into the rhythm of things and she was like, oh, this is not the normal time that he comes downstairs.

And there's another male voice. And she said she wanted to puke. She thought that he had brought his friends so that they could both quote unquote have fun. But the voice told Katie, Katie, it's safe for you to come out, but she's smarter than that. This is awesome sort of trick. If she comes out, John's gonna hit her. Katie, it's okay, we're the police. Let us help you. Let us help you gather your things and let's get out of here. And she finally listened, so after 17 days, she, with the police,

crawled up the bunker tunnel. Now, I don't know why, okay? But the police did not lead her out of the house. Instead, they decided to keep her in John's house interview her in John's living room. She was terrified. She could have responded. She thought that this was all a trick. These are the fake police.

John's paying them. These are his friends. When she left the house of the police, it said that she turned to give John a big hug and said, love you. What? Now, Katie doesn't remember this moment, but she said it doesn't sound so crazy or unbelievable that she would do something like that.

And I think that makes it so much more heartbreaking. Because when you're like 10, you're trying to make sense of it, you're like, maybe this is just how the world works. And like I think kids are also trained to like do these things. I think this is like also the new waves, like the new times that people are keeping up with. Like never train your kid to give people hugs when you say bye. Because you never know, you know?

Never be like, hey kid, go give them a hug. So she's escorted to the police car with just swarms of reporters, swarms of journalists outside. Now Marilyn and Linda weren't allowed to see her right away or during the court trial. Thank God. Linda waited hours with balloons and candy, like trying to document the moment with the price that she's reunited with Katie. It just seemed like both of the women were mainly putting on a show to see which one is Katie gonna jump to. Who's gonna- who's- who's gonna get the first hug?

So thankfully the court decided to put her in the care of a foster family. And at first when Katie found this out, mean this crushed her she was devastated. She felt so guilty. Did I do something wrong? Is that why they don't want me Marilyn and Linda? Did I do something wrong? She felt like she was dirty, but Katie was adopted by a nice couple named Ted and Barbara. They already had three children They welcomed Katie into their home with open arms and the first night that Katie was with them, she had her very first panic attack. And she really struggled. So at first there were a lot of supervised visits, eventually with Marilyn, Katie's mom, but Katie realized over time that these visits were just a reminder of her abusive childhood.

So eventually she would just go to the visits so that she wouldn't hurt Maryland's feelings. What do you mean she just go to the session? It's not because she wanted to see Maryland. It was painful for her, but she also didn't want to hurt Maryland's feelings. She started going to school. She had to be escorted in an unmarked police car because the front-end trances were filled with reporters trying to interview this 10-year-old girl. These journalists were like, yeah, I'm gonna catch her right on the school lawn in front of all her new school friends and ask her about the kidnapping. So Barbara did everything to try and make sure Katie adjusted well. She stayed up all night countless nights because her and dad were

terrified Katie would try to run away. And Katie was confused. She said that she's never really had people that would ask her for clothes were comfortable. If they fit right, if she was hungry, what type of food she was craving, they even asked her if she was tired. I mean, prior to this, nobody in her life even the adults had asked about her comfort. So she thought this was weird. And initially she was terrified of Ted. They're like a strange man, full grown adult.

She had not met a grown man that didn't try to touch her at this point, but she quickly learned that he was this gentle, caring guy. And she said that this is the first guy that she met, the type of gentleman that treated not only his wife, but all girls and women with a lot of love and respect. So the trial, John did, uh, he did get bail.

He didn't get bailed out, but there was a bail set for $500,000. Now nobody paid it, and he remained on suicide watch before the trial, and his lawyer tried to, tried to tell the judge, we need a more reasonable bail. Come on, John needs support and help right now. So the judge changed the bail.

To $1.1 million dollars. The judge was like, you're right, we do need to change his bail. Thank you for bringing that up. John was initially charged with second degree kidnapping, which the sentence is only 8 to 25 years, but it was later up to first degree kidnapping because of the sexual abuse in torture. He pled guilty, which is 25 years to life, but chance of parole after 15 years. Side note, why was he even given a plea deal? A lot of it centered around the fact that he had turned himself in, and they did not want Katie to go through an intense trial with the media circus. So during his sentence, he told the court, Your Honor, believe it or not,

Katie Beers is a very special person to me, in my own strange way. Two years ago, I believed in my mind that I was in some way going to help Katie Beers for the future. I knew full well and I admitted in court what I did, frightened Katie Beers, a great deal. I knew that for 16 days she was living in terrible fear and dread,

and it was very, very hard for Katie to believe that she was going to be released into the world again. I think Katie knows I'm sorry, and she didn't deserve this. I hope she comes through this okay, and I'm happy that she is a family that truly cares about her. After being in jail for more than a year and a half, I've thought about Katie many, many times, and while I did so, I realized how terribly wrong I was. And the judge said, okay, get out of here. So sell. Remember Uncle Sal?

Yes. Well, he also gets a trial. Now, the prosecutor offered him a plea deal to spare Katie again from testifying. He was like, here, take this plea deal. But he said, that little girl is a liar. That never happened. I never assaulted her. You know what?

I had sex with her once, but it's because she seduced me. Oh my God. He said that this, like, let's say she was like five or six at the time, seduced him. Jiao. Like I. Jiao done. So because of that, Sal got the trial.

He wanted. He wanted a trial. And he also had new charges. Defrotting Helen, assaulting Helen, assaulting Katie's brother, John sexually abusing at least three other children cheating on his taxes and animal abuse. Because it's a ledge that he had bashed Katie's cat's head into a wall making Katie watch.

During the trial, Katie testified for four hours and he would sit there and glare at her the whole time. She was so terrified during breaks she asked the judge. Can you please stop making him look at me like that? And he only got a sentence of 12 years. When he was released he refused to register as a sex offender so he was re-arrested, then released again and in 2007 he was living-arrested, then released again, and in 2007 he was living with his girlfriend

and her very young children. He actually died in prison though, in 2009, for all these other charges, not applying to be a sex offender. Somehow, I don't know, someone tell me how this happened. How did they, 12 years? And then he's not registered as a sex offender and they didn't catch him for a while and he's living with his girlfriend and his young kids.

I'm sorry, what? I just don't understand for someone who does, yeah, that much. For 12 years? Yes, 12 years. I, I, I, I, I, yeah, can somebody explain this? There are people who have life sentences for drug charges.

Yeah. Right, like weed charges, because the whole three strikes in your out rules. But this guy, this guy did all of that, but I just listed. So the aftermath, now I think that you really need to read the book on this because this is the most important part. Katie said that she was not the easiest kid to take care of after all of this, but her foster parents that she just calls mom and dad. they taught her, they were patient, she trusted them, she said that she loved cleaning her room and all of her stuff because

she finally felt like she had something that was hers. And she said in the book about them, it is because of them, I am certain that I am the woman that I am today. Had they not become my parents, I would have bounced around from foster home to foster home. And I would be living in Maestic Beach with six children by now and driving a taxi. My life would be a much different story. Katie's foster dad Ted was interviewed for the book and he said being kidnapped was the best thing that ever happened to Katie. And Katie said she kind of agreed in a weird way. She was so glad because it was this turning point.

She got away from Maryland, she got away from Linda, and she got these parents. And yeah, there's trauma and there's PTSD. But she is this strong woman, this author, this mom, this wife, you know. Wow. Because of everything she learned afterwards. So in 2013, John gets a parole hearing and he finally admits to sexually abusing Katie. So this is something that he has denied for the past 15 years. He said, yeah, I can't after, but I don't really sexually assault her.

He was not granted parole and weirdly, he died of natural causes in prison the same day. The same day? Yeah. And now, I mean Katie, she said she's had multiple times. She had gotten a summer job waitressing at a restaurant at one point in 2014. And she didn't know the dress code, so she had wore these jeans. Jester Boss is this okay? The boss made her do a 360 turn and said, if all your jeans look that good, then yes,

you can wear genes. And later he slapped her butt while she walked by and said, looking good, Katie. And she said, mm-hmm, I am not that little kid anymore. And she quit the very next day. She is not a defenseless little child. I'm like, Katie, drop the address. Katie, drop the rest of your name.

And now she's married. She's living her best life. She's got children of her own. She did change her name, you know, so she, you know, just respect her privacy. Get the book, I tell you, you need to read this book. It really, because I feel like a lot of the times we just don't know, we always say, what, what would have happened? Like, what kind of person would this person have grown up to be if someone hadn't taken them or taken their lives? So make sure to check out the book. I hope you guys enjoyed today's very, very intense episode.

Let me know your thoughts on all of this. And can you believe that sound only got 12 years? I'm so annoyed! And I will see you guys on Sunday for the mini-sode. Bye! And I will see you guys on Sunday for the mini-suit. Bye!