Kidnapped teen's return lifted spirits across nation

By Michael Tsai
Advertiser Staff Writer

Elizabeth Smart was photographed with her parents, Ed and Lois, at their home after her return. Elizabeth, who was taken from her bedroom last June, was found March 12. Advertiser library photo

Surely this was not what we expected. Not nine months after the Utah teen was kidnapped from her home in the middle of the night. Not after Danielle Van Dam and Samantha Runnion, last summer's other high-profile abduction victims, met such sad, brutal ends.

Even before the bizarre circumstances of her captivity began to emerge, the simple fact of her survival was enough to elicit joy and wonderment from strangers across the Pacific.

"It was incredible," said Sandy Watanabe of Waipi'o. "I just assumed someone must have murdered her, too. Either they would find her or she would just stay missing. I never guessed that she'd turn up alive."

Watanabe, a legal secretary, was at work when she saw a banner headline on cnn.com. First she told her co-workers, then she called her husband.

"I think we've gotten so programmed to expect only the bad news, that this one really seemed to come out of the blue," she said. "With everything that's gone on recently, it was really nice, a nice feeling."

But while Smart's happy return is the feel-good story of the young year, national media coverage in the days following may have raised some uncomfortable questions.

Until President Bush's ultimatum to Iraq displaced the Smart story, the coverage was relentless.

Anela Santos, a grandmother of two teenage girls, said she felt "elated" when she heard that Smart had been safely returned to her family. She wishes the story ended there.

"I watched the news to find out whether they caught the guy and if she was OK," Santos said. "But it didn't stop. Like every channel was filled with every little thing about her and the family, and (suspect Brian David Mitchell) and his background. ... I thought some things should be a private matter for the family."

At first, the news media could cite public demand to justify the coverage. America wanted to celebrate Smart's return, wanted to know who the mysterious suspects are, wanted to understand why an intelligent 15-year-old girl couldn't escape on her own.

Within hours, Internet news sites had compiled exhaustive, hyperlinked packages. In a vaguely disturbing move to some, cnn.com offered visitors access to a gallery of Elizabeth Smart photos.

By evening Hawai'i time, the major network and cable news outlets were jockeying for interviews with Ed Smart, Elizabeth's telegenic father.

At one point that evening, John Walsh and Marc Klaas — both fathers of murdered children who have become prominent advocates for missing and exploited children — appeared on three different news stations at once.

Walsh, host of the Fox network's long-running "America's Most Wanted," is just one of many who profited from the Smart story's happy resolution.

Walsh developed a close relationship with the Smart family during the nine-month ordeal. He interviewed Ed Smart — the most highly coveted "get" at the time — in a first-ever live edition of the show a week ago. Rumors have him as a potential producer for a TV movie.

Yet it's difficult to find fault with any of the parties involved.

Ed Smart engaged the media to help keep the public informed about his daughter's case — savvy handling that enabled two women to identify Elizabeth when they saw her with her alleged captors — and in turn has rewarded reporters with interviews, photo ops and press conferences. If the Smarts shook hands with the devil to get their daughter back, and the payback is their privacy, it seems like a deal they were happy to make.