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Peyton Moreland (14:14)

So all of this brings us to mid August of 2017. Jenna had been living on her own for about five months by this point and Leon and Roseanne had a trip planned to Canada. Problem was that they had to leave behind their 21 year old cat, Jesse. Now Jesse, the cat was very old and had some medical conditions. Every day someone needed to give the cat medicine and some of the meds actually needed to be injected with a needle. So the Van Gelderans needed to be careful about who they used as a cat sitter while they were gone in Canada. Needed to be someone who was responsible, who understood Jesse's needs. And obviously there is one obvious answer. Jenna. She'd always loved cat Jesse. The two of them had kind of grown up together and since she also knew how to take care of Jesse and handle the medical needs, she was the natural choice. So her parents asked Jenna to stay at their house while they were gone and kind of take care of everything. And Jenna agreed. And she also knew that Yvette was going to come over to the house on the morning of August 19th. So this person was supposed to give Jesse a shot that Jenna couldn't administer herself. It was pretty routine. Honestly. The Van Gelderins were used to vets making house calls. And it's also worth remembering that Jenna had always been very organized and good at sticking to a schedule. So she should have had no trouble watching the cat while the parents were gone. And then when the day came, making sure she was home that morning to let the vet in. Except when the vet arrived, they knocked on the door, and nobody answered. The house was dark and quiet, like no one was home. And the door was locked. Well, the vet isn't going to leave. They know that the cat needs the medicine, and they had already driven all the way out to the family's home. They didn't want to turn around and go home without seeing the patient. The good news is they had a phone number for Jenna's brother, Will. So they called him, and he rushed over to the house to open the door and let the vet in to tend to the cat. But once he got inside his family's home, Will found that the house was in an odd condition. First of all, there was no sign of Jenna anywhere. She would have never forgotten about this vet appointment. She would not have left without making arrangements for someone else to unlock and open the door. Plus, it was pretty obvious to Will and the vet that Jesse the cat was hungry. She clearly had not been fed. Except Jenna would never have neglected Jesse in ordinary circumstances. Now, the lights and the TV were both on, and Jenna always made a point of turning everything off when she left her room. She just would not have left the house like this, except clearly she had left. She had a suitcase full of clothes and things for her cat sitting stay, but the bags and her clothes were now all gone. Like she had packed it back all up and left with them. And so was her phone. And her car was also missing. However, her makeup was still in the bathroom. A pair of her shoes were still on the floor in the house, and her charger was even still sitting by the outlet. So this is all very weird. This just does not explain Jenna at all. And immediately it's a red flag. But something else was missing. It was something that kind of defied explanation. See, the family owned this big Egyptian tapestry that they had displayed on their wall, and it was about 5ft wide and 2ft. So it's a pretty big piece of art. Even though it wasn't worth much money, they kept it safe inside of a frame. Well, when Will goes in the house and looks at the wall, he realizes the frame is there, but the tapestry inside was gone. Someone had actually cut the glass to remove it rather than just like taking the entire thing. And it's just super weird for a few reasons. First of all, like I mentioned before, the tapestry didn't have any real financial value. The Van Gelderans kept it for sentimental reasons because it had been in their family for generations, but there was honestly no reason for anyone to steal it. Plus, other than the missing tapestry, there were no other Signs of a break in or a robbery. The house was still clean and tidy. It hadn't been ransacked. None of their valuables were missing. And of course, like I said, all of the doors were locked until Will got there to let the vet in. And it's not like Jenna had any reason to steal the tapestry herself. Even if she'd wanted to, she wouldn't have cut the glass out of the family frame. It would have been much easier to just remove the tapestry from the back of the frame. And more importantly, Will was pretty confident when he sees the house that Jenna, his sister, had not left the house intentionally. He knew she would never go anywhere for the night without her makeup chargers and shoes and leave the cat alone. She was very particular about always following her routine, which meant putting on makeup every morning, charging her phone regularly, taking her shoes with her when it was time to go. Maybe she had forgotten something if she'd left in a rush. Except if she was in that big of a hurry, why cut up a frame and take a big, bulky, useless tapestry with her? The scene when Will gets there as a whole is bizarre and confusing. So Will has no choice but to call his parents and explain the odd situation going on at home. Now, as soon as Leon and Roseanne heard the news, they knew it was serious. They know Jenna was not the sort of person to pull pranks or just take off without a word. So even though they hadn't seen the house for themselves, they knew something was wrong. They trusted their son, Will. So they booked the first flight back home that they could find. So that still obviously meant they weren't able to make it back for two more days. And during those two days, the situation just felt unreal. Intellectually, Jenna's mother and father knew this was an emergency, but on another level, it kind of just felt like a bad dream. Roseanne couldn't shake the feeling that any minute now, Jenna was just going to call and explain she was okay. And even when Roseanne pulled up to her house on August 21, she half expected Jenna to just come running out the front door. She'd have a wild story about what had happened. Except, of course, that was not the case. She and Leon went inside, and the house was in the same state that Will had found it. Nothing had been moved or disturbed. And that drove the reality of the situation home. It was pretty undeniable to the family that Jenna was missing. Roseanne and Leon called everyone they could think of. Family members, friends and casual acquaintances who knew Jenna. They asked everyone if they had seen or heard from her or if they knew where she was staying. But everyone said the same thing. No one had heard from Jenna since the 19th. This was the same day that Jenna had failed to let the vet into the house. So finally, Roseanne and Leon knew what they had to do. They called the police to report Jenna's disappearance. Now, right away, the investigators pulled phone records and traffic camera footage. They interviewed potential witnesses and before long, they'd kind of built a timeline. This is what they found out. They knew that Jenna was definitely alive and well on August 18, the day before the at home vet visit. That Evening at about 10.30pm, she went out with some friends. She stayed out late past midnight, but by 1:15 in the morning, she was back at her parents home. The police knew that from her phone records. She was inside when she called a friend, someone she hadn't gone out with that night. Now, her and this friend chatted for a while and then hung up. But afterward, Jenna and the same friend stayed up for a while texting. They actually texted each other until 2:15 in the morning. That's when Jenna sent her last text message ever. Said she was tired and she was going to bed. So there was no clue in the thread about what might have happened after that. No sign that she was in any kind of danger or feeling threatened. At least not anything that the police found in their preliminary investigation. It seemed like she went out that night, came home, talked to her friend, texted her friend, and then disappeared. Except they actually learned something else that is worth mentioning. They discovered that Jenna owned two cell phones. One was on the same family plan as her parents. You'll remember that Leon had gone through her records before Jenna moved out, and he was able to do that because of the family plan setup. But now the investigators learned that after that fight and her dad going through her phone, Jenna had actually bought a second foam that was not on the family plan. In fact, she was paying for it herself and she never told anyone in her family about it. This was a shock to the Van Gelderens and they didn't understand why Jenna would do it. The only theory they could come up with was that Jenna must have bought a secret phone so she could talk to people without her parents knowing. It gave her the privacy she was obviously craving. In fact, her second phone was set up so it didn't save any text messages. So even after the police pulled the records, they couldn't get a handle on who she had been talking to on this second device. But one thing was clear. Jenna had not Just been hiding her address from her parents. As the investigation goes on, they discover that she had been hiding a whole secret life. Now, this was a pretty big blow. It basically left Roseanne and Leon feeling like they didn't even know their daughter anymore. And she's now missing. But it got worse. See, by early September, Jenna still hadn't been found, and the police didn't really have any leads about her disappearance. By the fifth, it had been two full weeks of no news and no updates. But that day, investigators found Jenna's car. It was parked at the side of the road with a nearly empty gas tank. It was just seven miles from her house, and it was pretty obvious that Jenna hadn't driven it there. For one thing, the driver's seat was pushed way back, the way it would be if someone tall had been driving. And Jenna was only 4 foot 11. She wouldn't have even been able to reach the pedals, given how the seat was left. And on top of that, the police found a phone charger and a pair of shoes in the car. They weren't Jenna's shoes, and the charger wasn't compatible with either of her phones. So, again, this must have belonged to someone else. Except the police also found a pair of Jenna's shoes in the car, along with her glasses, suitcase, and wallet. Again, these were things that she would not have left behind after parking at the side of the road. So the discovery of the car isn't looking good. And here's where things get pretty weird. The police knew Jenna's car had been driving at about 7:45 on the morning of August 19th. This is just a few hours before she missed that vet appointment. They had learned that by taking witness statements and pulling data from automatic license plate readers. And they also knew that at that time, the car was near downtown Atlanta. But at almost the exact same time, her cell phone pinged a tower. And that tower was 30 miles away from Atlanta in a grassy wooded area. Which means that on the morning of the 19th, Jenna's car and phone were not together. Someone had the vehicle, and someone had the cell phone. And the cell phone ping was really concerning because that remote forested region was basically the perfect place to dump a body. It was far away from any potential witnesses, and all of the trees and underbrush could perfectly hide a crime scene.

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Peyton Moreland (26:21)

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Peyton Moreland (26:47)

Mama, Papa. Mi crese ah un ridmo alarmante Ila muy pento. The police eventually sent search teams to scour the woods and to look for Jenna. And while they didn't find anything, there was always a chance that they may have missed a key clue that could have broken the case open or even Jenna's remains. See, Leon and Roseanne were hopeful. They publicly announced that they would give a $50,000 reward to anyone who could provide any usable information about the disappearance. Except they don't get a single tip. They don't even get prank calls or people lying to collect the reward money. People all across Atlanta were silent. It was like Jenna had just vanished off the face of the earth. But her family still was not going to give up on her. They knew the police were trying to find her, but the Van Gelderans knew they could do even more. Every morning over breakfast, they would talk about what they knew, what they needed to learn, and what new strategies they could try. Now her brother Will actually talked to all of Jenna's friends. He scoured Internet discussion boards. He read every theory that was online. And each time he thought he'd found a new lead, he would chase it down and investigate it himself. It actually helped that before her disappearance, Jenna had actually shared her email and Facebook passwords with Will. They just kind of had that close of a relationship where she didn't hide anything from him. So now Will was able to log on, read all of her emails and DMs. And that's how he found a conversation from the night of Jenna's disappearance. It happened over Google Chat, and it was between Jenna and an account that Will didn't recognize. Now, in that conversation, the unidentified person asked Jenna to leave her parents house and come back to her apartment. Jenna made it clear she didn't want to. They kind of go back and forth arguing for a while. The other person applied a lot of pressure and acted pretty aggressive toward Jenna in these messages. But it was impossible for Will to say what happened after that if she agreed to head to the apartment or if the other person just gave up on trying to get her out of the house. Because, let's be real, Jenna had gone back to the apartment. That wouldn't explain much. It Would still be unclear why she would have taken her suitcase and a tapestry but left behind her makeup, shoes and charger. And on the other hand, if someone had attacked Jenna at her parents house, that also kind of doesn't explain the bizarre scene. I mean, it wasn't even clear if this chat had anything to do with Jenna's disappearance. And it's also hard to say what the police did did with this information, if they did anything. I do know that the Van Gelderans kept trying to find new leads after this one failed to pan out. Roseanne called hospitals and police departments to ask for updates. Every night she went to bed and she made sure her phone was nearby just in case Jenna might call and reveal that she was still alive and okay. Now, her mother and Leon prayed regularly. The rabbi at their synagogue led services where they asked God to sen Jenna home safely. And when nothing else worked, the Van Gelderins decided to give some statements to the press. Their hope was that if they could bring attention to Jenna's disappearance, they might reach someone who knew something. Maybe they would finally track down a tip that could save Jenna. Now, sadly, like almost everything in this case, it doesn't go anywhere. The case was growing cold and nobody knew what had become of her. And I hate to say it, but years went by without any new developments. And by late 2021, the Van Gelderins were losing hope. In fact, they believed that if Jenna was alive, she would have found some way to contact them. By now, it had been nearly four years with no news. The fact was that it was hard to stay optimistic. They needed some kind of closure just for the sake of their mental health. So as the fourth anniversary of the disappearance approached, they began the process to have Jenna legally declared dead. A week later, they held a memorial service where they could mourn her. And at the service, they also made another public call for tips. Because even if Jenna was dead, there was still a chance that they could solve the case and learn who had killed their daughter and why. Now, in the meanwhile, all they could do was come up with theories. And a lot of people assumed that Jenna's new friends were to blame. The people who had allegedly pressured her to steal from her job and gotten her fired, they believe might have kidnapped or killed her, too. The problem is those friends identities have not been made public. The police have never named any of them as suspects. So it's hard to say if there's any truth to this theory. And we certainly don't know what motive these friends would have had to kill Jenna. It's also worth mentioning that at the time of Jenna's disappearance, she did have a boyfriend, but his identity hasn't been released to the public either. The police questioned him, apparently soon after she went missing, and he said he was one of the last people to ever see her alive. In fact, the boyfriend said that the night before her disappearance, she dropped by his house, and while she was there, he claims he broke up with her. He also said that Jenna at the time was abusing controlled substances and she was doing sex work. I need to note that nobody has been able to verify any of that. These are all rumors that have come up in this case. There's no hard evidence that Jenna ever was doing sex worker using drugs. So it's impossible to say if the boyfriend was telling the truth. But for whatever reason, the police have ruled him out as a suspect, too. There's one other person of interest who's worth mentioning, and that's Jenna's roommate. But this is interesting. After Jenna's disappearance, her roommate refused to let the police search their apartment. This was in spite of the fact that he was already planning to throw all of her things away. According to him, he was annoyed that she had disappeared right before rent was due and she hadn't paid yet. He wanted to get rid of all of her stuff and find a new roommate to cover the month. But if all of Jenna's possessions were headed to the trash anyway, why wouldn't he just let the police look at them? The behavior was very strange. Except presumably the investigators knew something the rest of us don't, because they also ruled him out as a suspect early on. And without the friends, the boyfriend, or the roommate, it's kind of hard to know who else might have hurt Jenna. Which I hate to say is where things stand today. As of this recording, Jenna's disappearance is still unsolved. Her body has not been found, which means it is possible she could be alive. The local police are still collecting tips on her whereabouts. So if you think you know anything about Jenna's case, you can call 770-724-7715. She is a white woman with black hair and brown eyes. And at the time of her disappearance, Jenna was 25. She would be 33 by now. There is a star of David tattooed on her upper thigh. And when Jenna was last seen, she was in black yoga pants and a green T shirt with the words San Antonio written on it. Now, before I wrap up this episode, I want to return to the idea that I began with that sometimes families aren't perfect. And that was the case for Jenna and her parents. Clearly there had been some distrust and miscommunication, but even with all of this, they still loved one another. And to this day, Jenna's parents are still waiting for answers about their daughter. It is tragic that she disappeared while they were going through a difficult time and I only hope that they'll get solutions and closure soon. And that is the story of Jenna Van Gelderin. I think it is important to get this case out there in hopes that there is someone who knows something about what happened. I think the tapestry could be a pretty major clue because it wouldn't make sense for her to need it. So maybe someone else did. I truly believe in this case, someone knows something and it's time to come forward. Thank you so much for listening to this episode and I will see you next week as we dive further into the dark together. Goodbye.

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