Forensic Transmissions Episode 10: Saratoga Springs 911 Call
In February 2010, a woman called 911 in Saratoga Springs, Utah. She’d gone to get cigarettes with a man she knew, and they drank vodka together in the parking lot of the convenience store.Shortly afterward, she said she began to feel “extremely tired.” She says she passed out, and when she came round, she says she was naked and the man was on top of her. She asked him to take her home, but he said he had to run some errands, and began driving down the highway away from town. The woman told her abductor that she had to call her sister, because if she didn’t return home, her sister would call the police. She then called 911. Taking in the situation with great instincts, the dispatcher uses yes-or-no questions to learn that the caller is being held against her will. During the conversation, you can hear her whisper, “Help me!” It isn’t clear whether the woman’s abductor is not paying much attention or is simply clueless; she asks him about the road they’re on, the speed they’re traveling and the color of the vehicle they’re riding in–questions that would seem to suggest that the woman is not talking to her sister, or that her sister is strangely inquisitive. But she gets away with it, and manages to alert the police to the whereabouts of the truck. They are able to pull GPS information from her phone, so she needs to stay on the line until she’s rescued. Finally, officers find the truck and pull it over. The caller then becomes very emotional, and starts sobbing. She was still naked, and the man was partially undressed. Although he had a number of previous convictions, the man was not charged in this case because, as in so many rape cases, the woman decided she didn’t want to co-operate.