Posted on 04/30/2005 6:35:35 AM PDT by kellynla
Duluth bride-to-be who vanished just days before her wedding turned up in New Mexico and fabricated a tale of abduction before admitting Saturday that she had gotten cold feet and "needed some time alone," police said.
Jennifer Wilbanks, 32, was in police custody more than 1,420 miles from her home on what was supposed to be her wedding day.
"It turns out that Miss Wilbanks basically felt the pressure of this large wedding and could not handle it," said Duluth Police Chief Randy Belcher. He said there would be no criminal charges.
Wilbanks, whose disappearance set off a nationwide hunt, called her fiance, John Mason, from a pay phone early Saturday and told him that she had been kidnapped while jogging three days before, authorities said. Her family rejoiced that she was safe, telling reporters that the media coverage apparently got to the kidnappers.
But Wilbanks soon recanted, according to police.
Ray Schultz, chief of police in Albuquerque, said Wilbanks "had become scared and concerned about her impending marriage and decided she needed some time alone." He said she traveled to Las Vegas by bus before going to Albuquerque.
"She's obviously very concerned about the stress that she's been through, the stress that's been placed on her family," he said. "She is very upset."
The scene at the house Wilbanks shared with Mason went from jubilant, with Mason hopping from one TV interview to the next and joking about meeting Sean Hannity, to more subdued.
Everyone but immediate family was told to leave the house, and the blinds were drawn and the front door closed. Police put up crime scene tape to keep people away.
"Having cold feet is a joy compared to what the alternative might have been," friend Melinda Larson, who had planned to attend the wedding...
(Excerpt) Read more at ajc.com ...
To hell with this immature brat!
She put her mother, father, fiance through hell and you're concerned about HER?
give me a friggin break!
She should be locked up for a month, made to do community service for a year and fined for the costs of the police departments around the state!!
we could care less about being "cheated them out of a more interesting story"
The story is the immature brat has put her family, friends and fiance through hell!
And what happens the next time someone is REALLY ABDUCTED!
Does the police wait a day or two before it starts looking and in the mean time, someone actually DIES!!
Woman Found in Albuquerque
Mary Perea
Associated Press
A Georgia bride-to-be who vanished just days before her wedding turned up in New Mexico and fabricated a tale of abduction before admitting Saturday that she got cold feet and "needed some time alone,'' police said.
Jennifer Wilbanks, 32, had called her fiance from a pay phone late Friday and told him that she was kidnapped three days earlier while she was jogging, authorities said.
But she soon recanted, according to police.
"She was in discussion with detectives and agents and she decided that she needed to do the right thing and tell the right story,'' Albuquerque Police Chief Ray Schultz said.
Police in both New Mexico and Georgia said no charges will be filed.
Wilbanks had been missing since Tuesday, when her fiance reported that she went for her nightly run and didn't come home.
Schultz said she apparently left her home town for Las Vegas, Nev., on a Greyhound bus. She came to Albuquerque sometime Friday.
During initial questioning by police in Albuquerque she told authorities she had been kidnapped. But detectives said there were inconsistencies in her story and at about 4 a.m., she she told the truth.
"It turns out that Miss Wilbanks basically felt the pressure of this large wedding and could not handle it,'' said Randy Belcher, the police chief in Duluth, Ga., the Atlanta suburb where Wilbanks lives.
Wilbanks was tired and thirsty but was not complaining of any injuries, officials said. Her hair, which was long in pictures released by her family, was shoulder-length.
Asked about her emotional state early Saturday, Schultz said: "She is very upset.''
In her phone call to her fiance, John Mason, she claimed she had been adbucted and then freed by her captors.
"Jennifer said she thought the people got scared because of all the media coverage and just let her go,'' Ann Wilbanks, the woman's stepmother, told The Associated Press.
Duluth police traced the call to Albuquerque as the couple spoke, Ahrensfield said.
"She went to the pay phone at the 7-Eleven there and called her family. Then we were contacted through their police,'' she said.
Mason said he wanted to burst into tears when his fiancee called.
"When I finally put the phone down, it was like the burden of the world fell off my shoulders,'' he said outside the home of Wilbanks' family in Georgia.
Wilbanks, who is a nurse, was picked up by police on the corner of a main street near the 7-Eleven.
Mason and Wilbanks' family planned to fly to Albuquerque later Saturday — the same day that the couple had been planning to marry.
Just hours before Wilbanks was found, police in Duluth said they had no solid leads in the case and began dismantling a search center. Relatives offered a $100,000 reward for information and were planning a prayer vigil.
The hunt for Wilbanks had consumed Duluth, a tight-knit town. Her picture and newspaper articles about her disappearance were on telephone poles and shop windows. Police had also seized three computers from the couple's home.
The wedding, which had been scheduled for Saturday, was elaborate. The couple had mailed 600 invitations, and the ceremony was to feature 14 bridesmaids and 14 groomsmen.
Her uncle, Mike Satterfield, thanked people who had helped in the search.
"Jennifer had some issues the family was not aware of. We're looking forward to loving her and talking to her about these issues,'' he said.
___
AP reporter Kristen Wyatt in Duluth, Ga., contributed to this report.
I am telling you that if you take off and police departments are not alerted that you are safe.
I mean it was on all the news around the world
Not like she didn't know people were looking for her!
THE BIMBO SHOULD BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR THE COSTS INCURRED BY THE POLICE!
Let us all know when you catch up! LMAO
That would explain his odd comment to LE regarding cold feet, wouldn't it?
Runaways and people who commit suicide have similar issues in that regard.
I am glad she is alive but she should at the very least be fined to pay for the cost of the search
I'm fine with that if we do it for all runaways.
Now they'll do stories
about the pressures the world
puts on young women,
and they will follow
this woman through therapy.
(Her own show, maybe?!)
Granted, everyone freaked out and the police launched a massive search over this. The ONLY reason - and I mean THE ONLY reason the media picked up on it was because the woman was so close to her wedding day. That was the hook. That was the element that the media knew would tear at the heartstrings of the average American viewer.
Yes, the police should not have made a big thing out of this - the media was a BIG player in growing this story to national proportions. THe woman DOES have a right to go off to think about the biggest decision a person will make in their lives. However, she should have been adult enough to cll in the moment she say herself on TV or in the papers if only to say "Hey - I'm OK, I just need to think. You can call off the search, I'll be home in a day or two."
That's all she needed to do and this thing would never have gotten the legs it did.
Can you imagine if the police had been needed in a real seach for a child or something (God forbid) and this idiot used up all these resources. I hope they throw the book at her!
My wife heard on the news that he was flying out to get her.
If it was me, I would have left her there.
I didn't know I was required to alway let the police know my whereabouts if I'm not doing anything wrong.
But to put your family through this hell? Knowing they think you just disappeared and could have been kidnapped, raped, or killed.
Heck, one of them could have had a heart attack or something over this.
No, IMHO, either this gal has more in the closet regarding this, she is just plain mentally ill, or she has about as cold a heart regarding her own mother and father as anyone I have seen. I hope she gets help...but she should also stand acocuntable for what she did.
Whatever the case, I pray God will comfort and bless her parents and loved ones who so clearly cared for and were disraught at her disappearance.
BTW, pissant and Lancey, kudos for standing up for what you thought on the first thread. You were both spot on.
What a selfish little twit.
All about her.
Doesn't care that she put her family and her fiance through terrible pain...just all about her.
Well, I don't know about her fiance but I were him I'd dump her in a heartbeat...that kind of behavior is certainly something he doesn't need in his life. Imagine...they aren't even married and she can't take the pressures of the big wedding. Can only imagine how she would have handled everyday situations and problems that come with marriage and family. Why did she choose to have such a big wedding in the first place. 28 in the wedding party? Come on........I guess money was no object.
I wish her fiance well and hope one day he will meet a woman who will love him enough to never hurt him like this one did. He deserves better!
She didn't just go off. She made it appear that foul play was involved. All her personal effects were left behind keys, money ect. If she wanted to go off to think she could have took ker car, left a note not make it look as tho she was abducted while out for an evening run.
That is what I don't get. What the heck is in Albuquerque??? Why did she pick to go there? This makes no sense. This girl is wacked! She needs to be put in a mental hospital! I just can't believe what she put her mom and dad through. I'd rather die than put my mom through that kind of hell! She has to be nuts to do that!
Yes, but after blowing Dad's roll on a huge party, she probably didn't think it would be in good taste to simply call it off.
Some day people will wake up to the idea that a wedding is not a marriage.
Wouldn't her story of being abducted, short lived or not, be a criminal act of fraud?
It's one thing to decide to have sometime to yourself to consider whether you want to get married or not.
But to leave, and when found, state that you were abducted is a criminal act.
Short lived or not.
Most runaways know people are looking for them. They aren't stupid.
I wish you rotten luck in your crusade to criminalize running away.
Nothing is wrong with that, now that you explain it.
Not all of us here follow Xena around to see which previous conversations she has engaged herself in.
You sound as if you don't think she should be responsible for the cost of manpower/resources it took to "search" for her after she "vanished".
That's all.
That's good. His arms will be to tired to hug her.
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