Does anyone else know anything about his childhood? They didnt have to do that, but they did. And then this really deep sorrow and sadness for all the people, all the girls, his whole familyall the people who he had affected. 24/7 coverage of breaking news and live events. As Jans 16th birthday approached, Berchtolds contact became less frequent. This is the story of Robert Berchtold, the predator at the center of Netflixs Abducted in Plain Sight who groomed and manipulated an entire family. He told the school that he was CIA, and that they were on the run.. They settled in Utah, where . A Friend Of The Family: What Happened To Kidnapper Robert Berchtold, Dahmer Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story Sparked An Important True Crime Debate, Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story Can Solve 1 True Crime Show Problem, Criminal Minds: Evolution May Have Finally Set Up Spencer Reid's Return, The Last of Us Episode 8 Trailer Reveals Original Joel Actor's New Role, Disneys Double Show Cancellation Hints At Big Disney+ Changes. I guess it doesn't matter at this point, but since the doc is out and everything.looks like any kin he had will never speak of him Scan this QR code to download the app now. The affidavits compromised the FBIs case against B, according to the documentary. SANTA CLARA, Utah (ABC4 News) - Jan Broberg does not blame her parents for her abductions and rape at the hands of trusted family friend Robert Berchtold- even though many who watched the explosive documentary "Abducted in Plain Sight" on Netflix do blame them. Thats the only truly contact that ever has happened. Netflix first recounted the harrowing story in the 2019 documentary Abducted in . He brainwashed her with false narratives in order to sexually abuse her. I had never taken a vitamin before and honestly, I just couldn't swallow pills. I could look at the coat. Jamie Lee Curtis Is Both Weepy and Giddy About Her First Oscar Nomination. He found me at college. He convinced Bob and Mary Ann that his subsequent treatment by a psychologist involved spending multiple nights in bed with Jan. Neither one of us was comfortable with him doing it, Mary Ann says, but it was his therapy., The parental behavior that Mary Ann and Bob freely confess to in Abducted in Plain Sight is so bewilderingly naive that the more salacious and peculiar events Borgman goes on to lay out are almost hard to grasp. How did you find out about his suicide? But he kept pushing it until I finally explained to him that I couldn't swallow it, so he crushed it up and mixed it in some sugar and gave it to me. We watched Planet of the Apes on TV. Grace M. Galarraga is a writer based out of Southern California. I never felt like I needed to be validated. But now this man she didn't really know could let himself in at any time. There's somebody else who's doing it.". Jake Lacy in A Friend of the Family (Image credit: Peacock ) In the summer of 1972, Robert Berchtold moved a few blocks away from the Brogberg family in Pocatello, Idaho. But, as Welsh described, they were duped in a terrible, terrible way. The man Berchtold saw was not a licensed psychologist his license had been revoked. Berchtold was born on February 7, 1936 in Tremonton, Utah. It chronicles the peculiar kidnapping case of Jan Broberg, an Idaho. Despite the distance, Berchtold kept in contact with Jan, delivering her love letters and secret sets of instructions to meet with him. Over the course of the next six months, Berchtold slept in Jans bed roughly four times a week. "It's the smokescreen that a master manipulator creates," Broberg warned. He escaped jail time and moved to Utah to work for his brother. So it looks . That womans two daughters had been raped and molested [by him], and they ran away from home. Their home energy was quite ordinary for a few years, as per reports, yet everything changed shortly . The first abduction occurred when she was just 12 years old and the second, two years later, at the age of 14. Reddit and its partners use cookies and similar technologies to provide you with a better experience. Robert Berchtold had an obsession with his 12-year-old neighbor Jan Broberg, even sleeping in the same bed as her four nights a week. So I didn't feel wanted. Although Bob and Mary Ann Broberg refused, Berchtold returned home with Jan and things somehow went back to normal without any charges pressed. Thank you for taking the time to have this conversation. The 1967 film Guess Whos Coming to Dinner starred Sidney Poitier and Katharine Houghton as a ne, As the open-hearted matriarch Hattie Mae in Tyler Perrys 2022 film A Jazzmans Blues, Amirah Vann demonstrates a great tenderness and fierce love to b, This story includes spoilers for Saint Omer. My feelings get hurt easily and I have a hard time expressing myself without crying; I'd rather just shut down and stay out of the way. He talked incessantly about UFO sightings. I found my mother's cold reaction to be just what I expected from her. "I had my moments of being angry and upset," Broberg says about resentment towards her parents. He brainwashed the little girl to believe that she was half alien and half human, and that her mission in life was to have a child with him. According to Newsweek, Jan Broberg grew up to become an actress and an advocate for victims of childhood sexual abuse. Bob noticed that Berchtold had become sexually aroused. In a new book, Stolen Innocence: The Jan Broberg Story, Felt's mother reveals the details of the actress's childhood memories. I was sick to my stomach and felt like throwing up. He wanted to talk on the phone and to go out, and Bob didn't like it. Today, Jan Broberg has a "wonderful relationship" with her parents. I was interviewed for two days for the documentaryI spoke with Jan for hours and then the following day I spent hours being interviewed by the journalist. Robert Berchtold was ultimately given a prison sentence, but rather than face life behind bars, he downed a bottle of heart medication with Kahla and milk and ended his life. With a corresponding friend for every family member, the families quickly grew close to one another, and B became like "a second father" to Broberg. And so many adults knew, but nobody did anything. I kept it all to myself and kept going," she writes. I looked it up and her name was Moanna and is now deceased. They consulted with me constantly. Robert Berchtold is an abuser who groomed the Broberg family in order to become close to their 12-year-old daughter Jan. My mother worked two jobs, so there was a lot of time for that. It was like he was talking about an ex-girlfriend. But when we got to his apartment, his kids weren't there. Despite the outcome of her marriage to Robert, Gail found love again. It is made up of one wild story after another about 12-year-old Jan Broberg who went missing when a family friend, Robert "B" Berchtold, abducted her one sunny afternoon in 1974. They didnt want to know. All he ever got was a slap on the wrist, and then he was able to continue as before. Things That Didnt Make It Into Abducted In Plain Sight, Over the decades, popular culture has created dominant narratives of the Dominican Republic that are most often synonymous with poverty, crime, or state vi, This story contains spoilers for Ant-Man: Quantumania. But Berchtold did not just kidnap Broberg oncehe entrapped Brobergs religious parents in such an elaborate web of trust and shame that he managed to convince the family to drop the most serious charges against him, continue letting him spend time with their young daughter, andin the most shocking twist of allkidnap her a second time when she was 14. In 2005, Berchtold was found guilty of the assault committed during the Stolen Innocence book tour. He found my apartment and called my apartment. My sister Susan, who is an attorney, called his son Jimmy, an attorney. Thats like looking at my brainwashed self again. I really see those things as being almost separate. Because my happy, carefree world changed in an instantand that was the instant when I woke up with my arms and my feet restrained in a dark room and that voice, that was so terrifying. I would hang out with her, and her four siblings, most weekends. Thats why, she says, they didnt probe more when they knew something had happened. . He hoped to give Zachary a glimpse of his father. Cunning child predator Robert Berchtold would be accused of sexually abusing Jan Broberg over several years, but he would see little time behind bars for a multitude of reasons.. Peacock's original series, "A Friend of the Family," is based on the stranger-than-fiction story of the Broberg family, whose young daughter was twice kidnapped by trusted family friend Robert Berchtold. It took Jan years to learn to cope with the damage Robert Berchtold inflicted on her. Berchtold, it transpires, had repeatedly tried to infiltrate other families with young girls, and had been reprimanded by the high council in his church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, for doing so. Berchtold died in 2005, according to an obituary, which says he was a truck driver. Berchtold, played by Jake Lacy, did not just target Jan (Hendrix Yancey and Mckenna Grace), the series makes clear. He said he wanted me to take a vitamin. Its a surreal experience. Although he ruined Jans childhood, Berchtold never fully paid for his vile crimes against Jan Broberg in prison. In particular, the fact that the Berchtolds and the Brobergs were all part of the same faith community seems to merit more analysis than it receives. He found me when I lived in Florida, working for Disney World. After years of intense grooming, Jan started to gain romantic feelings towards Berchtold. It was a terrifying thought, Jan said. Bob and Mary Ann, Agent Welsh states, were told to cut off communication with the Berchtolds. Either it happened to you, Julie, or it happened to somebody close to you. Its like a heavy coat that I wore and that was a burden for me until the day I decided I could take it off. Brewer feels she did not get a chance to properly tell her story. Robert Berchtold's childhood The documentary only slightly went into "B's" past. So we went out to eat, he took me to a movie,we got some ice cream, then we went back to his empty apartment. I was working on myself. The new series also delves into how said abductor Robert "B" Berchtold manipulated the family.. And if you saw the 2017 true-crime documentary Abducted in Plain Sight, you know that Jan's father, the late Bob Broberg (who . At least I can keep telling my story without feeling like hes going to show up or hes stalking me. Because hed showed up [occasionally]. If they didnt, she said, then everyone would know about Bob and Roberts sexual exchange. The abuse went on for seven-and-a-half years. He was a salesman and my mother had contacted him about purchasing a traveling franchise. I mean, he just never really stopped. By the second kidnapping she had filed for a divorce, Broberg said. Taylor Swifts opening act on her debut album, Trumps Relationship With Jared and Ivanka. My dad isnt dead. Cookie Notice Not as much as I have been in past years. Susan called him and said, Your father said that youre his attorney. He said, I would never represent my father. But at the time, she said, they didnt suspect she had been kidnapped they thought she and Berchtold might have been in a car accident. The new Peacock drama miniseries, A Friend Of The Family, tells the true story of how kidnapper Robert Berchtold ruined Jan Brobergs childhood. A few people in the movie vaguely assert that it was the 1970s, and no one really understood what pedophiles were, or that intimate friends and family members could also present a real danger to children. Following the incident, he convinced the Brobergs that part of his therapy required him to sleep in the same bed as their 12-year-old daughter Jan while listening to tapes provided by his therapist. Now, Jan said, she sees that it was likely because she wasnt a little kid anymore. I kept it all to myself and kept going. Robert Hites Berchtold, 90, of Beaver Falls, formerly of New Brighton, died Thursday, September 10, 2020, in Providence Care Center. After Jan threatened to find her own way there, Mary Ann bought her a plane ticket and sent her to Berchtold. In 1974, he abducted the then 12-year-old, and once again two years later. If you can see yourself in this story, then we succeeded. About a month later, Bob took me to Ogden for the weekend to meet his five kids. Berchtold vehemently tried to denounce the book, claiming that they were lying about him and about the truth for a profit. But I could see Bob playing the tape, so I didn't believe him. Robert Berchtold was a well-known American truck driver, media face, retired US Army Officer who served the country during the Vietnam War and was also a convicted criminal suspect who kidnapped a too-young girl Jan Broberg in the 1970s. Of course, my insecurities show, and my anger pops out. They got confirmation on Nov. 11, 1976 102 days after Jan left her home. Broberg woke up strapped to a bed in an unidentifiable confined space that she learned years later was B's mobile home. They were just extraordinary. Abducted in Plain Sight was first released as a documentary in 2017 with the title Forever B, but its gained rather more traction this month after being added to Netflixs true-crime library. I told my husband about what happened but he doesn't want to know the details. Ive watched it several times nowThat has consistently been the one [that bothered me]. "I was this special person that was going to have this special child that was going to save the world," Broberg explained. After the war, he returned to Utah, got married, had children, and settled in the small town of Pocatello, Idaho, where he ran a furniture store. The new Netflix documentary Abducted in Plain Sight is a bewildering account of one girls kidnapping by a family friend. My dad did that with every boy I ever went on a date with. Posted: 21 August 2021. NetflixJan Broberg works as an actress, known for roles in Everwood and Criminal Minds. When I was 10, Bob tried to use the same alien story on me that he had used on Jan Broberg [an earlier victim who was abused by Robert Berchtold from 1972-1976. He would mention it every once in a whilethat I was specialbut he never mentioned that I needed to have a child to save some race or anything like that. The twisted tale began in the early 70s in the small town of Pocatello, Idaho. Her saga was admittedly complicated: When she was 12 and living in Idaho in the 1970s, a close family friend and neighbor who was decades older, Bob Berchtold, drove off with her one day, having told Brobergs parents he was taking the child horseback riding. But this time you were seeing an actor bring your abuser to life, witnessing two actors portray you during this traumatic period, and seeing actors portray your family. It did. I looked further and found that his real Dad died when he was 1, and his mother remarried to his Dad's elder brother (common to Mormon faith). They didnt forgive him. My little sisters not missing. Today there are specialists and programs designed specifically to deprogram people who have been brainwashed. Berchtold didnt stop tracking you over the years. Was your deprogramming gradual over the years, or was there one turning point in your life where everything clicked? He told the Brobergs he needed to sleep in Jans bed. Hes so funny and kind and warm. Wish he had gotten help somehow if he indeed suffered terrible abuses himself. The first time Berchtold kidnapped Broberg, he took her to Mexico and married her. Vanity Fair: Your story is so complicated, but the show does a great job at laying out this elaborate abduction plan beat by beat to show how Berchtold targeted your whole family. So I felt like I was protecting her from being hurt, by allowing the abuse to happen. Jan begged her parents to let her work with Berchtold for the summer. He served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War. Be the creator of your life. I guess she wanted a little girl who she could dress up like a doll, but I was a tomboy. Neither one of us were comfortable with him doing it, Mary Ann said, but it was part of his therapy.. B took the Broberg children and his own to science-fiction films in the two years prior to kidnapping Jan Broberg. 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