‘Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart’: 3 Heart-Stopping Moments From New Netflix Documentary

It was supposed to be a normal night. But when 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart and her nine-year-old sister Mary Katherine went to sleep on June 5, 2002, they both woke up to a nightmare: a strange man in their bedroom. Elizabeth was kidnapped at knifepoint. Mary Katherine was the only witness.

What followed was a months-long case that entwined the entire family in controversy and drew the nation’s attention to their hometown of Salt Lake City, Utah. And though the search had immediately begun the day after her abduction, it took nine months before Smart was found. While her family and the nation were searching for her, Elizabeth was forced to survive in an isolated mountain camp, where Brian David Mitchell and his wife Wanda Barzee practiced a muddled religion. Mitchell sexually assaulted her,  claiming she was his wife. After her rescue, Mitchell and Barzee were convicted of kidnapping and attempted kidnapping in both state and federal courts. Mitchell was sentenced to life in prison, while Barzee served 15 years and was released in 2018 .

Now, almost two decades later, a new Netflix documentary is revisiting the famous case and the months of abuse Elizabeth suffered before she made it home alive. Released on Jan. 21, Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart uses brand new interviews from Elizabeth, Mary Katherine, and people close to the case, including their father Ed Smart and police captain Cory Lyman. The documentary also includes never-before-seen archival footage taken during the search for Elizabeth. 

“I felt a lot of shame around what had happened,” Smart recently told People magazine. “I didn’t see or hear anyone else talking about it at the time. I didn’t know anyone who had something similar happen to them, and I ended up feeling very alone and very isolated. That made me feel like I should share my story,”

Here are three shocking moments from Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart

It took months for Elizabeth’s sister to remember who abducted her

Mitchell abducted Elizabeth from the bedroom she shared with Mary Katherine. Mary Katherine woke up and saw Mitchell standing over Elizabeth’s bed. He told Elizabeth if she screamed, he would kill her, and then left through the window. “I was paralyzed,” Mary Katherine says in the documentary. After the family reported the kidnapping to the police, authorities interviewed Mary Katherine several times. 

But the nine-year-old was severely traumatized by Elizabeth’s kidnapping and could not remember what the man looked like, only the sound of his voice. She told authorities that she had heard his voice before, but couldn’t recall where she remembered it from. During the investigation, police questioned handyman Richard Ricci, who had recently done work on the Smart’s house. Ricci was considered the lead suspect, but died from heart complications while in custody, soon after police questioned him. Nearly four months after Elizabeth’s kidnapping, Mary Katherine finally remembered where she recognized the voice from. She told her parents it was Emmanuel. 

Emmanuel, whose real name was Brian David Mitchell, was a homeless man in downtown Salt Lake City who met the Smart family while he was out proselytizing. Ed hired him for small jobs working on their home, but the family was never close. While Mary Katherine identified Emmanuel to her parents, interviewers at the police station doubted her testimony. 

Cops encountered Brian David Mitchell multiple times while he was holding Elizabeth, but let him get away

A key aspect of Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart is Elizabeth’s memory of the time she was held captive. Smart, now 28, says after she was forced out of her house, she was led up a trail to an extremely remote camp. “I asked him if he was going to rape and kill me. Because if he did, I wanted him to do it as close as he could to my house so that my parents could find me,” she says. “He just had this terrible smile and he just looked at me he said, ‘I’m not gonna rape and kill you, yet.’”

At the camp, Elizabeth met Barzee, who was introduced to her as Hephzibah. Mitchell called himself Emmanuel David Isaiah and said he was told how to act by God. Elizabeth spent months being raped by Mitchell, many times with Barzee in the room or next to her. She was shackled, sexually assaulted, given alcohol, and often denied food and water. At one point, she heard searchers calling her name, but Mitchell threatened her, telling her to stay quiet. Searchers walked past the camp without noticing it. 

While the camp was extremely remote, Mitchell and Barzee brought Elizabeth into the city on at least two separate occasions. During these trips, the entire group wore strange robes, and Barzee and Elizabeth were required to wear white headdresses that covered their faces entirely. During a trip to the library in Salt Lake, an investigator who identified himself as a homicide detective approached the group and asked to see Elizabeth’s face. Mitchell would not let them take off her veil, citing religious beliefs, and the detective left them alone. “The thought of crying out did cross my mind, but I was 14. I had been extremely abused for months,” Elizabeth says in the documentary. “I didn’t feel safe crying out and that lifeline disappeared.” 

Police also realized that Mitchell was in police custody once during the search for Elizabeth. He was arrested for stealing beer from a local store, and arrest photos showed him in his cell in strange religious garb and a long beard. The police let him go. 

Elizabeth played into her captor’s ego in order to escape

Close to six months after Elizabeth’s kidnapping, there were several moments where her family and authorities were convinced that she would never be found. After disagreeing with police, the Smart family went against their advice and released a sketch of Mitchell. He was identified by his brother-in-law, who called his concerns in. In a tape recording played in the documentary, the unidentified caller described Mitchell as “just crazy enough” to commit the crime, also noting he often stayed at a small shelter in the mountains. 

As the police search intensified, Mitchell traveled with Elizabeth away from Salt Lake. The group camped near San Diego, California for months, where the abuse and mistreatment continued. In the documentary, Elizabeth describes how Mitchell told her that he was planning on moving the group to a much larger city. Afraid that she would never see her family again, Elizabeth appealed to Mitchell’s ego and religious delusions to convince him to bring her back to Salt Lake. 

“I have this feeling. I think we might be supposed to return to Salt Lake. And I know God wouldn’t really speak to me, but I know if you were to ask him, he would confirm to you whether or not that was the right path,” she recounts telling him in the documentary. “Because you truly are his servant and you truly are his prophet.” He took her advice.

The group was walking on a road in Sandy, Utah, on the outskirts of Salt Lake City, when police once again stopped the group. When they were able to separate Elizabeth from Mitchell and Barzee, she confirmed that she was Elizabeth, and they took her to safety. To this day, the family still considers Elizabeth’s return a miracle.