‘It was like seeing a ghost’
Escape of girl, 13, missing for months shocks residents
Teacher Kristin Kasinskas was at her home, in Gordon, Wisconsin, on Friday when a neighbour started frantically knocking on her door. The neighbour had been walking her dog in the area, a subdivision known as Eau Claire Acres, when a teenage girl came up to her in the cold and asked for help.
The girl was Jayme Closs, who had been missing since October, when her parents James, 56, and Denise, 46, were found dead, having been shot and killed in their home in Barron, Wisconsin, about an hour away.
“Call 911!” the dog walker told Kasinskas.
The moment marked the end of the 13-year-old’s escape after being held captive for months.
“Jayme is safe!” Barron County Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald said. “It’s amazing, the will of that 13-year-old girl to survive and escape.”
Jake Thomas Patterson, 21, of Gordon, Wisconsin, was arrested soon thereafter, and charged with homicide and kidnapping.
Jayme, officials said, had escaped from a home while Patterson was out. They found Patterson in his car, “driving around,” apparently out looking for her, Fitzgerald said.
Officials said Patterson had planned his actions and prepared for kidnapping the teen. They said there is nothing to indicate that he knew or had contact with the family before the incident, and said they do not know how he came to fixate on Jayme.
Fitzgerald said investigators were in the process of confirming that a shotgun recovered in their investigation was the one used. The Closs’ door had been shot open; Patterson
had shaved his head so as not to leave hair behind, Fitzgerald said.
Patterson had worked for less than two days at a turkey processing plant where Closs’ parents worked, but the sheriff said he did not have any contact with them.
Fitzgerald said officials did not yet know how Jayme escaped, saying only that she had been released from the hospital and was being reunited with family.
“Jayme is the hero in this case, there’s no question about it. She’s the one that helped us break the case.”
Kristin and her husband Peter described to the Minneapolis Star Tribune the experience of seeing Jayme on their doorstep. The killing of Jayme’s family and her own disappearance had been a major subject of news and attention in the area.
“I honestly still think I’m dreaming right now,” Peter Kasinskas told the
Star Tribune. “It was like I was seeing a ghost.” Jayme was invited inside and offered food and water, which she declined. She played with the neighbours’ puppy, Penny, and waited for police to arrive. “She said to us that, ‘This person killed my parents and took me’,” Kristin Kasinskas told CNN. “She said that this person usually hides her or hides her when others are near, or when he has to leave the household.”
Jeff Closs, Jayme’s uncle, said that the teen’s return was shocking. “You’re not sure if she’s going to be found,” he told NBC, “and when you actually hear it, it’s just unbelievable. We’re all just so grateful and happy. We thought it was going to be a different ending.”
Jayme’s aunt, Jen Smith, said: “I just cried lots of happy tears. I just wanted to scream very loudly.”
Jayme’s name rose to the top of the FBI’s missing persons list, and authorities offered a US$50,000 reward for information leading to her recovery. Some 2000 volunteers took part in searching rural Barron for the girl.