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Kidnapped girl found 18 years later

(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-08-30 17:59

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif.: Some knew her, others only knew of her. But they will never forget the day 18 years ago when the blonde, blue-eyed 11-year-old was snatched in broad daylight on her way to a bus stop.

Jaycee Dugard is seen in this undated handout photo. Dugard who was kidnapped in 1991 at the age of 11 turned up at a California police station on Wednesday, authorities said, and a couple accused of abducting her has reportedly been arrested. She had been missing since she was abducted near her home in South Lake Tahoe on June 10, 1991 by two people in a gray sedan. [Agencies]

Her scream. A frantic sprint on a mountain bike by her stepfather up the twisted mountain road as he tried to catch up to the Ford Granada and the unknown man and woman who had just ripped his family's lives to shreds before his eyes.

A world renown tourist destination, South Lake Tahoe on the Nevada-California line is dominated in summer by gamblers, boaters and beach goers. In winter, by gamblers, skiers and snowboarders.

But beneath the facade of a tourist town, where workers come and go with each passing season, is a tight-knit community that never forgot Jaycee Lee Dugard, a little girl who loved the color pink.

Her mother, Terry Probyn, and stepfather, Carl, were relative newcomers to the Tahoe community.

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"They were brand new to the district," Sue Bush, Jaycee's fifth grade teacher, said Friday. "I met them at parent-teacher conference twice."

But the community shared their nightmare and embraced them, holding fundraisers, putting up fliers and adorning the town in pink ribbons to keep Jaycee in their hearts after she was kidnapped June 10, 1991.

In 2001, 10 years later, more than 100 people marched on US 50, the main highway through town, in a pink ribbon parade to remember the little girl and raise awareness of child safety and Jaycees' unsolved kidnapping.

Terry Probyn, who left Tahoe in 1998 and moved to Southern California, returned for the anniversary.

"Someone out there knows what happened," she said at the time. "We need peace. Give us that gift."

It arrived, out of the blue, Wednesday night when she received a call from investigators, saying her daughter had been found alive. Nearly two decades of questions, what ifs, and suspicions against Dugard's stepfather, Carl Probyn, were replaced by tears of joy.

Phillip Garrido, 58, and his 54-year-old wife, Nancy, were arrested last week on suspicion of abducting Dugard. They pleaded not guilty Friday to a total of 29 counts, including forcible abduction, rape and false imprisonment.

Investigators said Dugard was taken to a house in Antioch, where she was kept hidden from the world in a secret, leafy backyard, where she lived in a shed compound.

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