The Elizabeth Smart Case
 

This has all the makings of a juicy story.

What do you think the ultimate reality will be?

Feel free to add your own conspiracy or whatnot.

I want to know why in the world a 15 year old that has been away from her family for about 9 months has not had a chance to find a way to get in touch with them or do anything to escape.
It sounds rather fishy to me but what do I know I have barely read this thing through so I may be back to either add more or to correct what is in this thing.

The lack of information in the 'information' we're getting from the news is frustrating.

Just looking at the pics of Mitchell/Immanuel and his wife sets my 'crazy' detector off. He looks like one of those people that you can tell is a nut from a long way away. I think it will eventually be revealed that there are cult-recruitment aspects of this situation ... not necessarily an organized, established religious cult, but rather a cult-like structure imposed by this Immanuel dude.

Of course, I don't think we'll ever get the WHOLE story.

As far as why she didn't try to escape/contact her family? Two options, the first being that she was a willing participant in the events, the second being Stockholm Syndrome ... although "willing participant" might be more likely here ... after all, if she were coming from a controlling, repressive family (they just come across that way, IMHO, on TV) and saw what Mitchell offered her as some kind of freedom/responsibility for herself ...

As more info comes out on this, I'll have to get in contact with my friend who is a cult exit counsellor. He might have some interesting insights into this.

I have that feeling towards most anyone that refuses to wash their hair.

I'm not so sure I follow on all this "Stockholm Syndrome" that I keep hearing about? Anyone willing to offer up some details/history? Ahhffffffffffff-shit. I'll just google it.

I also doubt that we'll hear as many details as we would like. I do have a feeling that something "funny" went on here. This chick is obviously old enough to understand survival and what being held captive is, especially if her family has a tv.

As highly discussed as the Elizabeth Smart case has been nationwide, the discussion is no doubt thickest right here where it all happened in Utah. What would compel an intelligent 15-year-old girl to allow herself to remain captive, without making ANY successful attempt to contact her parents or authorities? Why did no one else report spotting a young girl in the company of two people who appeared to be vagrants, and loony ones at that? It is very unlikely that the captors hadn't seen one of the dozens of billboards, hundreds of posters, or thousands of flyers all over the Salt Lake City area emblazoned with "Kidnapped!" and her photo... yet they walk down the street ith bedrolls in hand and flowers in their hair, as conspicuous as can be.

Many questions, few answers. I also doubt we'll ever get the whole story. A point of some interest though, my girlfriend was at the Sonic drive-though just across the street from there about 30 minutes before they found the girl. Crazy stuff.

At what point does the name 'Patty Hearst' eventually arise? Was she a willing participant or was she a victim of Stockholm Syndrome. The latter is still denied by many of us as a poor excuse to stay out of jail.

To adamantly endorse what Wolf says - no one here has anywhere near enough perspective to draw any conclusions. All we can do is speculate, and learn more facts about this interesting psychological phenomena from the few who have actually dealt with such events.

Patty Hearst was declared guilty, in part, because a naive girl locked in a closet, threatened with guns, and raped could never be forced to participate in a bank robbery.

Apperently she was tramatized I just heard on fox news the jerks that kidnapped Elizabeth had her in a hole in the ground and were raping her I looked up fox news and my paper that has stuff come up every half hour here are the links:

Charletson Post and Courier..
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/sto...MPLATE=DEFAULT

Fox News website does not have the latest scoop like what I just watched a few min ago. I will try to get the link later unless someone else gets it first.

Yeah, tw, I was waiting for someone to mention Patty Hearst. I'm surprised no one else mentioned it. The SLA did a number on Hearst, but that's a good question about her culpability.