Jayme Closs is now back with her family after been held captive for 87 days.
BARRON COUNTY SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT
The 13-year-old disappeared the day her parents were found murdered at their home in Barron and reappeared months later, 70 miles away.
On Monday 15th October 2018, emergency services had a call at the family address at the family home from a mobile phone and heard a disturbance in the background, but no-one spoke to them directly. Four minutes later police arrived, no gun or suspect were found at the scene and there was no sign of Jayme. The following Wednesday the deaths of James and Denise Closs were officially ruled as homicide by a medical examiner, they were shot dead. Police said they had received 400 tips from the public since 13-year-old disappearance and there was an amber alert for her.
Jake Patterson, 21, is accused of killing Jayme’s parents to abduct, he told investigators that he watched Jayme Closs board a school bus that he had stopped behind whilst driving to work. The charging documents quotes that Mr Patterson as saying that when he sae Jayme “he knew that was the girl he was going to take.”
Mr Patterson told police he only had worked at the factory two days and ended up spotting Jayme one of the two mornings he drove to work. He also said he had plans to take her outside her home but abandoned the plan because there were too many people.
Mr Patterson described the measures he had taken to avoid being detected by police. This included shaving his head, stealing license plate, wiping the shot gun with gloves on and modifying his car boot so it could not be opened from the inside. The documents show that Mr Patterson stormed into the family home by forced entry, Jayme and her mother took themselves into the bathroom where they heard gunshots and suspected they killed Jayme’s father. Mr Patterson allegedly broke down the bathroom door and forced Denise Closs to help tape Jayme’s ankles and hands together before shooting her. Jayme was then dragged into the boot of his car.
Jayme had told investigators that Mr Patterson had drove 66 miles to a rural cabin where she was kept until she managed to escape. She told police how he would sometimes make her hide under his bed when family and friends were at the cabin. According to Jayme Mr Patterson “would make her stay under the bed for up to twelve hours at a time with no food, water, or bathroom breaks”.
On January 10th, 2019 Jayme said she was able to escape as Mr Patterson had left the house and told her she would be alone for five to six hours. Jayme said he would trap her under the bed with weights all around the bed so she would not be able to get out. However, that day she was able to push the weights and crawled out the room; she had taken a pair of Mr Patterson’s shoes and ran on foot. She eventually found a neighbour who helped her contact the police. This neighbour was Jeanne Nutter, she was walking her dog when Jayme approached her and identified herself.
When Mr Patterson was confronted by police, he stated ‘I know what this is about’, adding “I did it”. He was found within 11 minutes after they recovered Jayme.
