Her 16th birthday came and went, and when she woke up the next morning to see that everything was fine, she knew the aliens werent real. [Berchtold] was [close to another family] when he died. As Mary Ann described, they got a little too cozy and the first seeds of what would eventually grow into an affair were planted. She doesnt recall violent rape but said, I would just look at the leaves If you just look at the leaves, itll be okay.. In the doc, he said he was sexually abused by the "help", didn't feel part of the new family (mother had other children to new husband) and slept in a separate bunkhouse. Where are you in the healing process now? And if youre not happy and you need medication or you need more talk therapyyou should get what you need so you can heal. That was terrifying and surreal because I was finishing a speech for a thousand women and their daughters. Jake Lacy Biography. My dad isnt dead. After picking Jan up from piano lessons and drugging her, Berchtold dragged the unconscious child into his motorhome, bound her wrists and ankles to his bed with straps, and set up a small device to play a recording. 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. After the first kidnapping, her parents were completely unaware of the sexual abuse. He said he wanted me to take a vitamin. She endured some of the worst imaginable psychological manipulation during her childhood. He drugged her and transported her to Mexico in his RV. Watching Jake Lacy become Berchtold was seamless. He brainwashed her with false narratives in order to sexually abuse her. I didn't know it was wrong right away. I mean, he just never really stopped. Im so glad youve found relief. Manipulation and grooming are not understood by so many. The Peacock drama miniseries A Friend of the Family shows how Jan Broberg was kidnapped twice when she was a child after her abductor ingratiated himself with her parents. I said, Did you do some deep dive on my dad that I dont even know about? Hes like, No. I didnt want to marry her, Broberg said. But now this man she didn't really know could let himself in at any time. Karen Campbell, one of Jans sisters, comes closest to analyzing what happened when she posits that her parents are simply experts in denial. 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). For viewers watching at home, though, judging the Brobergs is easier, even if its hard to ever feel fully informed, or to believe that the family knew what they were getting into by airing everything so publicly. Youve revisited this chapter of your life before in your books, documentary, and speaking engagements. Warning: Contains SPOILERS for A Friend of the Family. [The older sister] came to the conference when he showed up with the gun. He would pick me up from school and take me to his place, his motor home, our place or just in the car in the middle of nowhere. Jan Broberg is now the executive producer on the Peacock miniseries based on her life, A Friend Of The Family. His mother was still alive during the whole ordeal, she would have been 60 years old or so when he abducted Jan, Must have been hard for her witnessing this of her son. 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. By the second kidnapping she had filed for a divorce, Broberg said. Bob recalled saying to her, Dear, youll regret that decision someday., She stayed in Jackson Hole for two weeks, continuing the mission and living with Berchtold. 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. The altered state of having been abused and how that affects your psyche and your life and your choices and your thinking and your self-worthIm worthless. When the two saw each other again in court, she told him, My goal, Mr. Berchtold, is to educate the public about predators like you. That doesnt stop me anymore. Berchtold then fled with Jan to Mexico, where he married her and asked her parents permission to return to the United States and be legally wed under U.S. law. Berchtold didnt stop tracking you over the years. It is a lifelong process. When Jan Broberg shared the story of her stranger-than-fiction kidnapping in the 2017 documentary Abducted in Plain Sight, she did not anticipate the charged response it would elicit. Robert 'B' Berchtold, her abuser, played by Jake Lacy, had befriended Mary Ann in the church and spent a good two-year time gaining their trust. . Berchtold killed himself in 2005, before being sentenced for simple assault, criminal trespassing, and disorderly conductcharges stemming from that conference where he showed up with the gun. So that I get to be the doctor. NetflixMary Ann Broberg described Berchtold as having a charisma that Bob didnt possess.. But when we got to his apartment, his kids weren't there. Robert Berchtold was the Broberg's neighbor. Broberg was missing for roughly a month during the first kidnapping, during which she was sexually assaulted by B. We will do a better job. Which is how those next four years, as you see in the series, unfold, because I really did think [the aliens] would take [my sister] if I didnt do the mission. The district attorneywho had basically prosecuted his showing up at that conference with a gun as a registered sex offendercalled me. They consulted with me constantly. But I could see Bob playing the tape, so I didn't believe him. He doesn't want to think about it. I wanted this for a long timeto tell the story in a way that would affect the most change and the most understanding so that people could avoid this happening in their own life or help any traumatized young person get to a healthy, happy place. Idaho, who quickly become close pals with their new neighbor, Robert Berchtold, and his wife and kids. Privacy Policy. In a candid conversation, Broberg tells VF about the surreal experience of seeing her abuser brought to life again. The day after the series premiered, Broberg says she feels huge relief that a more complete version of the story is available. Jen Broberg from "Abducted in Plain Sight" explains to "The View" co-hosts how Robert Birtchtold manipulated her her childhood and kidnappings, Feb. 25, 2019. It did. The abuse went on for seven-and-a-half years. When the Brobergs met the Berchtolds at a church service, it seemed like a match made in Heaven. You can never blame them or their family members who didnt know. She has been writing about entertainment news since she started writing journalistically in high school. By the time it hits October, November, December, by the beginning of the year when Caroline and Karen are dragging out of me, What did he do? I knew that that [the alien] part wasnt real. Yet only 10 minutes of my story made the documentary. In 2005, Berchtold was found guilty of the assault committed during the Stolen Innocence book tour. The story is dramatized. You have to have this baby by your 16th birthday. All of that brainwashingI knew that wasnt real when I [later interacted with boys] and had that moment of going, Okay, I havent been vaporized. I hope theyre doing okay, especially his kids. Robert Berchtold took Jan Broberg horseback riding one afternoon when she was 12 and disappeared with her. Vanity Fair may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. By rejecting non-essential cookies, Reddit may still use certain cookies to ensure the proper functionality of our platform. When I first met [Hendrix]. [They made it] look like my childhood home. Berchtold had a family of his own, and his children would often play with the Broberg kids, including Jan, according to ATI. You have to believe victims. By Nicky Idika. Part of the problem is that Abducted in Plain Sight, a 90-minute movie in a field populated mostly with six- or eight-hour series, is focused entirely on telling a story rather than illuminating it. I didnt know people wouldnt get it. Over the past week, viral tweets and Reddit threads and various expressions of incomprehension have batted around the internet, as viewers try to make sense of what exactly theyve just watched. I cant imagine being in their shoes either. [My sister] Karen isnt blind. On Oct. 17, 1974, Robert Berchtold picked up his young neighbor Jan Broberg from her piano lessons in Pocatello, Idaho, so he could, he claimed, take her horseback riding. I was shy, so I didn't really speak to him a whole lot. It was the thing that kept me obedient.. Robert Ersol Berchtold, 69, of Logandale, died Nov. 11, 2005. It was released on October 2022 on Peacock and had its finale on November 10, where Jan Broberg appeared as Dr. Carr, the real therapist the Berborg worked with. I would hang out with her, and her four siblings, most weekends. How involved were you with the making of the show? Of course, my insecurities show, and my anger pops out. 2 . It was only five or six years ago, when I found Jan Broberg's book about her ordeal and contacted her, that I found out he had only served a year in prison after being found guilty of the rape of a child. The 56-year-old actress, who was abducted, raped and abused by family friend Robert Berchtold in the 70s, Speaking to ET Online, Jan explained how her attacker didn't lie with her under the . Directed by Skye Borgman, Abducted in Plain Sight begins in the early 1970s in Pocatello, Idaho. By the time I was 14 or 15, it got to the point where Bob would just take what he wantedit didn't matter whether you were willing or not. Which he adds, emphatically, They. 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. "When people ask me about the brainwashing, I'm like, 'It took 10 seconds.' It felt like we were meeting dad. Mckenna Grace, 16, plays teenaged Jan Broberg opposite pedophile Robert Berchtold (Jake Lacy) in "A Friend of the Family" -- and said she wanted to "vomit from how gross it is." I wanted to play in the dirt and toss a football. October 5, 2022. Let me inform you that Read More Robert Berchtold Wiki, Wife, Age, Family, Brother . Was that after the documentary came out? Today, Jan Broberg has a "wonderful relationship" with her parents. Oh. Everyone Practices Cancel Culture | Opinion, Deplatforming Free Speech is Dangerous | Opinion. 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. Heidi Brewer met Broberg while filming this documentary. Jill and I were very close, we were like sisters. The series itself elegantly and subtly captures in a vivid way the crimes of Berchtold but also the naive air of the 1970s and the seeming inability to comprehend the disturbing nature of such predatory crimes. 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. Berchtold vehemently tried to denounce the book, claiming that they were lying about him and about the truth for a profit. As Jan Broberg later described in the documentary Abducted In Plaint Sight, Everyone had a best friend.. I get to be the examiner. He was a truck driver and served in the U.S. Army . I remember waking up in the morning and not feeling well at all. the way she approached me and the way she smiled and the way she was like, Oh, can we hug? It was [like] watching myself. I made statements and, because I was a minor, I didn't have to testify in court. Before we moved to Salt Lake City, my mother had been so overprotective of me that I wasn't allowed to play in the front yard by myself. 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. Related: Dahmer Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story Sparked An Important True Crime Debate. I wonder if he abused her at all? Within a couple of months, we moved from our home in Texas to Salt Lake City, Utah, which was 45 minutes from where Bob lived. I could look at the coat. Yet, despite the wealth of content, many viewers continue to have questions over exactly what happened to Robert Berchtold after the traumatic events. Their childhood was . Robert Hites Berchtold, 90, of Beaver Falls, formerly of New Brighton, died Thursday, September 10, 2020, in Providence Care Center. I didn't know the abuse was wrong until I was 12 or 13. 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. According to Newsweek, Jan Broberg grew up to become an actress and an advocate for victims of childhood sexual abuse. Watch it on Netflix. I never saw a psychiatrist or a therapist. Its very close in every way to how it truthfully unfolded. Jan Broberg went on to be the subject of her mothers retelling of her story, Stolen Innocence: The Jan Broberg Story and was part of the 2019 Netflix true-crime documentary Abducted in Plain Sight, detailing the twisted affair. Jan Broberg whose story about being kidnapped by her neighbor Bob Berchtold inspired Peacock's "A Friend of the Family" has written a new book about the experience, with her mother MaryAnn. 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. I can't imagine how many girls there were before Jan, between Jan and I, and how many came after me. For years, actress Jan Broberg kept the story of childhood sex abuse she endured at the hands of a family friend mostly private. We think hes in the parking lot. Im like, What? She traveled to meet him, and he begged her to leave her husband and live with him. 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