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| © 2004 Chelsea Standard
Original Document Found Here
Chelsea Standard 20040122
INSIDE
Police suspect girls were being lured into sex ring
By Scott Hagen, Staff Writer
• Dexter High School students safe now.
A three-day journey that started in Dexter ended when two high school students were found safe Jan. 14 some 1,400 miles away in New Braunfels, Texas.
One of those girls, Brianna Fortner, 18, said she was unaware of the consequences and possible repercussions of her decision to accompany her friend, 16-year-old Teri Chiado.
When the two were found in the small Texas town about four hours from the Mexican border, Fortner said she didn't realize her friend was planning on continuing the journey into Mexico. Police believe Chiado was heading toward Ensenada, possibly to meet a 24-year-old man she spoke to on a popular "gothic" Web site called "Children of Acid."
Fortner, admittedly upset since her brother, a Marine, left for Iraq last summer and having trouble adjusting to Dexter, said she planned on getting out of town and staying at Chiado's brother's house in Indiana.
"These are my problems," Fortner wrote in a letter she left for her parents,
"and I need to work them out alone and away from this town, and the people in it."
But then Chiado said they were going to Texas. With no money and no options, Fortner went with her friend. After leaving at 4 a.m. Monday morning, the two girls reportedly drove straight through, with a short stop in Indiana, until arriving in Texas late Tuesday night.
After sheriff's detectives from Washtenaw County accessed computer records that showed online chat friends, a cross reference of prior phone calls revealed Chiado may have been in contact with someone in New Braunfels, located between San Antonio and Austin. Detectives then called Comal County Sheriff's deputies and asked them to drive by the house. The girls were found there.
Through e-mails taken from Chiado's computer, deputies were concerned she was on her way to see the 24-year-old man in Ensenada, and that she may have ended up in a smuggling ring that lures girls into Mexico and forces them into prostitution.
"I came very close to never seeing my child again," said Fortner's mother, Char Smith. "I think (Brianna) realizes now just how horrible it could have been."
When deputies there informed the girls that they were most likely heading toward a trap, Fortner was "mortified," Smith said.
"It's not unheard of - and it's not just young girls - for people to come up missing and end up in Mexico," said Lt. Mark Reynolds of the Comal County Sheriff's Department.
Chiado was brought to the Guadalupe County Center in Seguin, Texas, until her father could arrive. Fortner was questioned briefly to obtain a positive identification. Since she had done nothing wrong and was an adult at 18, she was immediately released. Fortner flew back on the same flight, though not together, as Chiado and her father, John.
"I wish I had never left," Fortner said.
Chiado is still waiting to face charges in juvenile court for stealing her father's car. She chose to remain in the center based on her own fears she would try to leave again, said her stepmother, Stacy Herrin.
For the Chiado family, things are starting to look better.
"She looks wonderful," Herrin said of Chiado. "She's smiling again. We haven't seen her smile in months."
For both families, a three-day nightmare of questions, doubts and fears is over.
"What people need to know, it can happen in little-middle-of-nowhere Dexter," Smith said. "Don't think it can't happen here and don't think it can't be your kid."
Staff Writer Scott Hagen can be reached at (734) 475-1371 or shagen@heritage.com.
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Thanks to MaDHorNeT for giving us a heads up about this amazing event.
Modifications were made to the html content to make it HTML 4.01 Transitional compliant, and to highlight certain details.
Contact information has been modified for people outside the newspaper's origin.
Would like to thank Scott Hagen for not contacting me directly.
I enjoy good reporters who take the time to investigate everything so they get their facts right (yeah right!).
In fact, the police never contact me either.
And a big thanks for labeling us 'Gothic'.
For an encore, I think today I will label 'Lords of Acid' as 'Heavy Metal', cause it just sounds good and acceptable. NER!
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