Anything Knitted and Crocheted

Welcome to my blog. I hope to blog about my knitting and crocheting as well as everyday life. The patterns that I post are original and as such there is copyright on them. When they are based on another pattern there is a link to the pattern.

My husband and I adopted a beautiful dog named Leo. He is a dachshund and absolutely adorable! we adopted him on June 23, 2010 and he has become the love of our lives.

I love to share patterns that I find along the way or to talk about some of the neatest designers that are out there today, so I love to post links to the designs or the designers.

So grab a cup a and sit and enjoy the blog.


Cora

Monday, June 29, 2009

Jessie Foster, Victim of Human Trafficking, Still Missing

Jessie Foster, Victim of Human Trafficking, Still Missing
By dwilliamson
http://hubpages.com/hub/Jessie-Foster--Victim-of-Human-Trafficking--Still-Missing

I am writing this hub in hopes to help a mother find her missing child. My hope is that everyone will share this hub with everyone they know so that we can find Jessie. The more people hear about her story and see her photographs, the better the chance of finding her.
Jessie Foster, Victim of Human Trafficking, Still Missing

Jessie Foster, Victim of Human Trafficking, Still Missing

1. What is Jessie's full name, age, birthdate and description?

FULL NAME: Jessica (Jessie) Edith Louise Foster
AGE (when missing): 21 ~ AGE (current): 25
BIRTHDATE: May 27, 1984

DESCRIPTION
RACE: Caucasian
HAIR COLOUR: Blonde (may be dyed brown or other colour)
EYE COLOUR: Hazel
HEIGHT: 5’6” – 5’7”
WEIGHT: 110 – 120 lbs

2. How long has Jessie been missing now?

Jessie has been missing since March 29, 2006, but officially is listed as missing between March 29 and April 9, 2006. The reason for this is because we know the last time anyone we know of talked to Jessie was when her and her sister Crystal talked on the phone on March 29, ending the call with ‘talk to you tomorrow’, but that never happened, we also know that she was not around after that because she would have called us, or called someone – BUT, because the police did not take the report until April 9 (after we had confirmed that Jessie was not at her stepsister’s wedding in Mexico with her dad and stepmom – which she was not), so that is the date that they finally went to the house at 1009 Cornerstone Place, North Las Vegas, Nevada, USA 89031, where she was living with her fiance Peter Todd for the past 10 months and found nothing out of order (obviously).

3. Can you explain the circumstances of Jessie's disappearance?

THIS IS THAT LETTER I SENT TO CRIMINAL PROFILER PAT BROWN…IT HAS THE ENTIRE CIRCUMSTANCE NOTED – Pat, thank you so much for your time. My daughter JESSICA EDITH LOUISE FOSTER originally met Donald Vaz in Calgary, Alberta Canada when she was just out of high school. Her boyfriend at the time, Jon was a Hip-Hop DJ and she would go with him when he did his ‘gigs’. Jon is the person who told us this about Donald.

When I was having a bit of trouble with my youngest daughter in early 2005, Jessie, who was living in Calgary, packed up her apartment and put everything into storage and came home to Kamloops, British Columbia to ‘help me get Jennee back on track’. Which we did, within a very short time. While Jessie was here, she was working 2 jobs – she was a waitress at a Boston Pizza and also worked at Rivershore Golf Course.

Shortly after she was home, Jessie started getting phone calls from Donald – he wanted her to go on a trip with him, to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to visit his mother. We found out later his mother lives in Canada. I was leery about this offer, as any mother would…and I asked Jessie if he wanted ‘something’ in return. She assured me he did not. Jessie went on the trip, came back with lots of fun pictures and great stories.

Then a couple of weeks later Donald Vaz called again and asked Jessie to go on another ‘trip’ with him. This time to Manhattan, New York and Atlantic City, New Jersey. I really questioned his motives this time – saying flat out that a man would not take a beautiful woman on 2 ‘all expenses paid’ trips and not want or expect something in return. She told me that Donald was not like that and she was going to be okay. I was not totally convinced, but I took that to mean I was being a mom and that there would be no answer that would convince me she would be fine. So she went.

Jessie called me, her dad and one of her sisters from the lobby of the hotel they stayed at in Manhattan telling us all almost the same story, with a little more told to her sister than to me and a little more to her dad than her sister. This is what the story was: DONALD LOST HIS MONEY GAMBLING AT A CASINO AND WANTED JESSIE TO PROSTITE HERSELF TO GET THEM ENOUGH MONEY TO GO HOME. We do not know the exact extent to this, but ultimately she told us that everything was ok and she would be home the next day.

But that never happened. The next day Jessie called me to say that instead of flying home directly – her first plan was that she would fly from New York to Ontario, Canada and then west back to Kamloops. She was now flying to Las Vegas, Nevada then north to Kamloops, BC. This was May 13, 2005. She called when she got there and said she was going to stay until her 21st birthday, May 27, only 2 weeks away. I was not happy with this at all, but she was not a child…she was my child, but she was an adult.

The only thing I told her, that I demanded actually – was I needed a contact number from SOMEONE in Las Vegas, because, sadly, I said to her, ‘if something happened to you, if you went missing, who would I call?’ – obviously never expecting that 10 months later she would go missing. She gave me the number to her friend, Yvonne Hubrechtsen…I have no idea where she met her or how she knew her, but she gave me her number and told me her nickname was Angel.

Jessie called someone every day – if not me, it was one of her sisters or her dad & stepmom or one of her many friends. She phoned, text-messaged, emailed and left voice-messages when no one answered. EVERYDAY someone heard from Jessie. After finding out all we know, I realize that several things were done – Jessie’s constant contact with us was so we knew something was wrong when she stopped it – and it worked. We knew within the first day and for sure the second day we never got a hold of Jessie when we called and she never returned our calls. We never knew what was happening to her in Las Vegas, but she did.

It turned out that Yvonne’s boyfriend, Richard Wolcott was also a pimp and had a friend named Peter Todd, also a pimp and they ‘introduced’ Jessie to Peter. Before we knew it, Jessie was in love with him and had moved into his ½ million dollar home at 1009 Cornerstone Place, North Las Vegas, Nevada 89031 (after looking it up, this address was originally owned by Sierra 2598, Inc – Sierra is the prostitute name of Peter Todd’s estranged wife, Trish Van Arsdale – then the property was sold to Trish and then Peter’s name was put it – after than, Trish’s name came off it and Peter Todd, a non-American citizen with no ‘legal’ source of income [this was a quote from the Timothy Bedwell, spokesman for the North Las Vegas Police Department] – so ultimately, Peter Todd owns a house without having a job).

What we never knew and found out after hiring a private investigator, was that Jessie had been beaten so badly she had to be hospitalized (know this about Jessie – she never once got into trouble as a child or teenager, she never smoked cigarettes, pot or did drugs, she never came home drunk or had friends who got into trouble with their parents or the police – when anything happened to Jessie, she cried and ran to me, her mommy…for example, when she was 15, she had a seizure brought on by the heat of a tanning booth she was in, and woke up to her head banging up and down on the top and bottom of the booth…obviously it scared the crap out of her…she came home, and when she came in the door I looked at her and said ‘Jessie what it wrong’, she ran to me, sat on my knee and told me, crying her eyes out it scared her so much [FYI: we had her tested prior to that time, and did not have epilepsy or ever had another seizure again…that was the 3rd in about 8 years].

Jessie is a family girl and is very, very close to me and her sisters [Crystal-27 in December; Jessie was 25 in May; Katie will be 23 in December & mother of my grandson Jacobus almost 6 months old; and Jennee was 19 in February, mother of my granddaughter Maddison almost 1 ½ years old and she is pregnant, due in December].

Jessie is also a VERY popular girl and has LOTS of friends – from kindergarten to grade 11, she went to school with the same kids, we have lived in this house since June 27, 1987 – my kids all went to my old elementary and high school and we live 1 ½ blocks from the house I grew up in, my mother passed away in on March 22, 1998 and my dad still lives in today. One month into grade 11, Jessie very badly wanted to go live with her dad & stepmom in Calgary. Her reason was that several of her friends she hung around with graduated and were not in school with her that year, plus the fact that she had never as a child lived with her dad (we separated when Jessie was 1 ½ months old and Crystal was 1 ½ years old – we have always had a good relationship and parented the girls together, from different cities, and provinces), and she told me this – ‘Mom, if I do not like it in Calgary, I can come home and graduate with the kids I went to school with forever, but if I like it, I will stay there and graduate with my new friends’. She made a good point about growing up and would never live with her dad while in school if she did not do it then. Both Dwight & Tracy and Jim & I agree and she moved.

There was a very traumatic thing that happened the day she moved. Jessie’s bestfriend, Shauna Heys and 2 other girls drove to a city about 4 hours away early the day before – Jessie actually would have gone, if she was not getting on the Greyhound Bus at 7:00am the next morning. I had just got back from dropping her off and my phone rang…it was very early and I was surprised. It was one of Jessie’s friend’s parents asking me if Jessie was home. I said no, she was on the bus moving to Calgary to live with her dad…she asked me ‘if I was sure’. I said of course, I just dropped her off myself. She told me there was a terrible accident at 4am and one of the girls who went with Shauna was in very serious condition in the hospital. It turned out to be Sabrina…a beautiful 16-year-old girl who was an actress who just got a job with a new Canadian series that was to begin taping…she died. It was terrible. If Jessie had of gone, she would have been sitting ‘shotgun’ in Shauna’s car – it was her permanent spot – it was where Sabrina was sitting when the accident happened.

I called Jessie’s sister and dad in Calgary and when they picked her up, they told her about Sabrina and their dad drove them both straight to the airport and they were back in Kamloops that evening. Jessie and Crystal went back to Calgary after the funeral. I never got to talk to Jessie face-to-face right after this – Sabrina was a very good friend of hers, and over the phone and by the next time she came home for a visit, time had passed. I really do not know way deep down how badly this affected her – and I know it affected her. We did talk a lot, but not her crying in my arms, like a mom does for her girl. I feel terrible about this.

Jessie got hit by a car in Calgary on her way to school one day. She was crossing on a walk sign and a car turned right on a red light, striking her and causing damage to her leg. Jessie never played in sports again and that was hard for her. When Jessie turned 19 she got a large insurance settlement from this accident. When Jessie went to the USA she still had over $10,000 in the bank – she as planning on going to college with it. Some people told me she was ‘attracted to the money of Vegas’, implying she ‘chose’ to go there and ‘chose’ to work at a escort agency, even though the owner of this service told me that ‘Jessie did not belong there’ and she tried to convince her to ‘go home, little girl’, as this woman told me personally.

Wow, I have gone on and on, and the fact is, I do not even know what you need from me…sorry. but I will also add this – Donald Vaz, mentioned earlier, and his brother have a history of arrests and convictions (mostly for the brother) for forcing young girls into prostitution, and beating a woman who was a prostitute…there are several newspaper articles on these cases. And Yvonne Hubrechtsen, also mentioned earlier, was arrested and the charges dropped for ‘transporting a minor across a state line for sexual purposes’ – AKA: human trafficking…IN MY OPINION.

Richard Wolcott and Peter Todd are both known pimps, as it Donald Vaz. Yvonne Hubrechtsen and Trish VanArsdale are both convicted prostitutes. Trish VanArsdale also threatened my daughter several times…this was told to me by Jessie, Peter Todd and Peter’s twin brother, who works for an elementary school, James Todd…that Jessie was scared of Trish and if she was home alone (James lived with Jessie and Peter), she NEVER answered the door for fear Trish was on the other side. ALSO, I have talked to someone who saw Jessie after Trish cut her hand with a knife and Jessie was bleeding and freaking out about her boyfriend’s crazy jealous ex-wife cutting her.

Jessie talked to her sister Crystal on March 28, 2006, making plans for them to meet here in Kamloops so they could drive together in Jessie’s car, still parked in my backyard since Jessie went to the USA; to Calgary for their stepsister’s wedding reception in April. They were to talk the next day and we have never heard from Jessie again, EVER. Shortly after Jessie’s got a letter from her insurance company in Calgary, which I opened – there was proof of insurance for 1 month for her car while she was to be home. She paid around $200 for it with her credit card. So, obviously she was planning on being here.

4. I have heard that you believe that Jessie is a victim of human trafficking, why do you think this?

I have always believed Jessie is a victim, but originally I do not know why I thought that…but I have. Then in 2007 when I got in contact with ATLAS (the Anti-Trafficking League Against Trafficking), the task force officer on Jessie’s case told me that the places that Jessie was taken in the USA (Fort Lauderdale, Florida; Manhattan, New York; Atlantic City, New Jersey; and Las Vegas, Nevada) and all part of the hub in the USA for human trafficking.

5. Have you had any leads whatsoever in this case?

We have not got any leads that I would consider good enough, since we have not got Jessie back yet. Plus the police do not tell me anything that goes directly to them. However, the very last lead we got came to us from the POLARIS PROJECT. They got an anonymous tip and sent that to Crime Stoppers in Las Vegas, who then passed it on to the police on the case in North Las Vegas. Because this info was also sent to me, I also sent it to the RCMP’s Serious Crimes Division here in Kamloops who also have a file open on Jessie’s disappearance.

6. What agencies are you involved in with regards to Jessie's case?

Many. There is the NLVPD (North Las Vegas Police Department) ~ case #: 06-9384; RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) ~ case #: 2006-9538; NCIC (National Crime Identification Number) ~ M-535642358; Crime Stoppers Las Vegas; Crime Stoppers Kamloops (and Canada); ATLAS (Anti-Trafficking League Against Trafficking) ~ Las Vegas, NV; several other human trafficking task forces in the USA and Canada; Polaris Project ~ Washington, DC USA (and worldwide); Laster Global Consulting ~ Dottie Laster; Las Vegas Detectives ~ Mike Kirkman (Private Detective); Missing Persons Organizations worldwide (there are so many online, I have no way to mention them all) ~ NCMA (National Center for Missing Adults) ~ Project Jason ~ CUE Center ~ Peace4theMissing ~ Search for the Missing ~ and many, many others; 3 bounty hunters (2 in the USA and 1 in Canada) ~ Media everywhere (the Geraldo at Large show ~ April 24, 2006; the Maury Povich Show ~ October 11, 2006; the Montel Williams show ~ May 24, 2007 with an update show filmed here at our home July 8, 2008; America’s Most Wanted ~ November 15, 2008; ABC’s Nightline: Hunting Human’s on the Highway included Jessie’s picture in this show) ~ May 15, 2009; E! Entertainment show has filmed a documentary called Young, Beautiful & Vanished (not aired yet) ~ August 26, 2009; W-Five contacted me in May about an interview for a show ~ August 2009; many TV, Radio, Newspaper & Internet interviews; National Enquirer ~ August 2008; Oracle 20/20 ~ September 2008; CrimeWatch Canada Magazine ~ October 2008, January 2009 & May 2009; TruckerJob.com magazine ~ May 2009; and Jessie’s story was also told in a book by Canadian author Lisa Wojna called MISSING! The Disappeared, Lost or Abducted in Canada ~ August 2007. Like I said, there is just too much to mention everything and so I am very sorry to anyone not mentioned here.

7. You have done a lot of work in trying to find your daughter. Can you explain what you have done so that this may be of help to other parents in trying to find their children that are missing?

First off you have to contact the police…as obvious as it is, many people do not report their loved ones missing soon enough because they are only 99% sure something is wrong and they do not want to make anyone mad at them – who cares…they will get over it if they are not really missing. You need to get it reported ASAP. Also, get a website set up – it is the best way to get the information out to more people. There are so many missing person’s organizations available online, you need to contact as many as possible – for example, there are missing person organizations, there are missing person blogs, there are missing person forum and each of those are different from each other. There are also networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace and there are online ‘newspapers’ such as NowPublic. There are many, many more but again, too many to name and there are more than I know of. Google is a great search engine (again, not the only one, but the one I use the most) and you can find sites on there. ALWAYS contact the media. They are usually short-lived when it comes to a missing person’s case, so get them involved right away and don’t stop contacting them because you have not heard back. My first email to the Montel Williams show was April 16, 2006 and on April 17, 2007 I was being interviewed by him on the stage of his show in New York City, NY. It took 1 year and 1 day, but it happened. Plus Jessie’s case was one of the most talked about shows, and was included in his last year of shows, which was entirely updates to shows that people wanted to hear more about. I also tried to get America’s Most Wanted to do Jessie’s case since she went missing and was not done until November 2008. So do not give up – sometimes it takes time.

8. How can anyone contact you if they have any information on the whereabouts of Jessie?

My phone number is: 250-374-6137, my email address is: glendene@telus.net or jessiesmom@jessiefoster.ca; I am on Facebook ~ Glendene Grant: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/profile.php?id=1684265972&ref=name and MissingJessie Foster: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1643822787&ref=name and on MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/jessiesmomglendene.

9. Is there anything you want to say to Jessie in hopes that she gets the chance to read this hub?

There is so much I want to say to my Jessie-Bessie. I LOVE YOU BABY. I miss you and I will never stop looking for you until I find you – there are SO MANY PEOPLE helping us look for you, supporting our search and praying SO MANY PEOPLE PRAYING. Please know this. Do not be scared, stay safe so you will stay alive. You will be rescued one day and baby and you will come home, if you are in heaven, we will see each other again one day. I WILL FIND YOU JESSIE, OR DIE TRYING. The rest I will say when I find you.

10. Is there any advice you would give to anyone else that is searching for their children that have gone missing?

DO NOT GIVE UP. Never give up the search for your loved one. They deserve it and you deserve answers…even if the answers you get are not the ones you are hoping for, remember this – after over 3 years, I am ready for any news…I just want to know. If my daughter is not alive, she deserves to come home just as desparately as if she was alive. She would need to R.I.P. and that cannot be done if she knows we are still looking for her, still looking for answers – so never give up searching and be grateful for any that you get. Some people never get them. And once you get answers, you can start to get justice. That is also very important. If your loved one is not alive, you need to get justice on their behalf – that is most deserved for all innocent victims of crimes.

For more information, please go to the sites listed below or simply enter “Jessie Foster” into any search engine and you will be overwhelmed by so much information, even you won’t believe it – I know sometimes I don’t. For example, from Google – WEB: Results 1 - 10 of about 11,800 for "Jessie Foster" (0.21 seconds); IMAGES: Results 1 - 20 of about 3,450 for "Jessie Foster" (0.16 seconds); VIDEO: Results 1 - 10 of about 50 for "Jessie Foster" (0.15 seconds); GROUPS: Results 1 - 10 of about 33 for "Jessie Foster” (0.20 seconds).

JESSIE FOSTER IS PROBABLY MOST WELL-KNOWN, UNKNOWN MISSING PERSON IN THE WORLD. SHE IS NOT KNOWN BY ALL, BUT SHE IS KNOWN BY ALL MISSING PERSON’S ORGANIZATIONS AND THOSE WHO WORK WITH MISSING PEOPLE. We have not completed our job yet though, as Jessie is still not home where she belongs, please help us find Jessie.
===================================
REWARD: $50,000 to the person who helps us find Jessie
Check out our WEBSITE: http://jessiefoster.ca
Sign up at our FORUM: http://findjessie.com
Read my JESSIE BLOG: http://jessiefoster.blogspot.com
Read my JESSIE NEWS ARTICLES BLOG: http://jessiesnewsarticles.blogspot.com
Read my JESSIE NEWS LETTER BLOG: http://whitepicketfencenewsletter.blogspot.com
Follow me on TWITTER: http://twitter.com/MissingJessie
See Jessie’s case on AMERICA'S MOST WANTED: http://www.amw.com/missing_persons/brief.cfm?id=60803
See how Jessie’s case was included on ABC NIGHTLINE: Hunting Humans on the Highways: http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=7582591
See (the very long, but extremely important) 2009 TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS REPORT: http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2009/index.htm


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Cora Shaw (formerly Levesque)