The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart

Three-year-old Lori Poland is playing outside her Colorado home when a stranger lures her into his car. He drives her into the mountains and abandons her 15 feet underground in an abandoned outhouse. As police launch a desperate search, Lori's abductor refuses to reveal her location. For four terrifying days, she remains trapped without food or water, until an extraordinary twist of fate leads to her rescue. Now, Lori tells Elizabeth Smart the harrowing story of her kidnapping and what happened to the man who left her to die.

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Elizabeth Smart is back with three extraordinary survivors — Lisa Mae, Eduardo Valseca and Alisa Mathewson — to answer more of your burning questions. They revisit some of the most harrowing moments of their stories, share new details about their experiences, and reveal how surviving unimaginable violence has shaped the way they live today. From the split-second decisions that saved their lives to the challenges of rebuilding afterward, they offer candid answers and powerful insights into what it really means to survive.

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Everyone is talking about Amy Acton after her estranged mother appeared in a political ad calling the Ohio gubernatorial candidate “a liar.” Acton has also spoken openly about surviving childhood sexual abuse. Elizabeth Smart, Deondra Brown and Michelle Denault — all survivors themselves — talk about the controversy, what sexual abuse can do to families, and what this moment looks like through the eyes of survivors.

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After a desperate escape attempt fails, Alisa Matthewson is recaptured, bound, and taken even farther from safety. When her 55-hour ordeal finally ends, she expects to be reunited with her children — instead, she finds herself fighting a new battle to get them back. In the finale of her story, Alisa reveals what happened when her case finally went to trial and the man accused of kidnapping, raping and trying to kill her chose to cross-examine her himself.

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Alisa Mathewson wakes at 3:00 a.m. with the terrifying certainty that someone is standing in her bedroom. It is her estranged husband — the man she has spent months trying to escape. In Part One of her story, Alisa reveals how her desperate attempts to break free from his control culminate in a middle-of-the-night break-in that leaves her bound, drugged and fighting to stay alive.

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Eduardo Valseca is locked inside a tiny box, its coarse walls tearing at his skin whenever he moves. He doesn’t know where he is, what has happened to his wife, or why the men holding him refuse to speak. Then the message comes: his captors want millions of dollars in ransom — and when his family can’t pay, his captivity stretches on for seven months of beatings, starvation and torture.

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As the sexual assault allegations at Cornell University dominate the headlines, Elizabeth and fellow survivors Kimberly Corban and JoDee Neil engage in a challenging conversation about consent, reporting, bystanders, and what people still getting wrong about trauma. Plus the "Three D" rules for protecting young people at college parties. 

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After surviving more than 26 hours in captivity, Lisa Mae reaches the police expecting them to help her — only to find herself fighting to convince investigators that her story is true. Then a news report about another murdered woman leads Lisa to a chilling realization: the man who abducted her is the serial killer terrorizing Tampa.

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Seventeen-year-old Lisa Mae has already decided she doesn’t want to live. Then, riding her bike home through the darkness after a late shift, she notices a car sitting strangely in an empty church parking lot. Seconds later, a man lunges from the shadows, presses a gun to her head, and drags her into his car. Suddenly, the girl who had planned to end her own life is fighting desperately to keep it.

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For the first time, Elizabeth sits down with three fellow survivors — Kara Robinson Chamberlain, Chris Cander and Kimberly Corban — to answer questions directly from listeners. They share new details from their remarkable stories, talk about facing dangerous situations after their attacks, and reveal what surviving taught them about spotting danger, trusting their instincts and staying alive when the unthinkable happens.

For information and resources related to mental health, domestic and sexual abuse, child abuse, and human trafficking, go to ElizabethSmartFoundation.org

We seek to bring hope, empowerment, and change in the fight against sexual violence.

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Three weeks after Kimberly Corban is attacked in her own bedroom, police bring in a suspect — but can Kimberly identify him, even though she never saw his face? In the finale of her story, Kimberly reveals how investigators uncovered why a complete stranger targeted her, what happened when she faced him in court, and how a day once defined by trauma would eventually become something very different: the day she was brave.

For information and resources related to mental health, domestic and sexual abuse, child abuse, and human trafficking, go to ElizabethSmartFoundation.org

We seek to bring hope, empowerment, and change in the fight against sexual violence.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Twenty-year-old college student Kimberly Corban wakes in the middle of the night to find a stranger inside her bedroom. Unable to see his face and terrified that her roommate could be next, Kimberly focuses on surviving the attack — while quietly memorizing everything she can about the man holding her captive. In Part One of her story, Kimberly reveals how she endured her terrifying captivity, preserved the evidence her attacker left behind, and made a desperate 911 call that would launch a manhunt.

For information and resources related to mental health, domestic and sexual abuse, child abuse, and human trafficking, go to ElizabethSmartFoundation.org

We seek to bring hope, empowerment, and change in the fight against sexual violence.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Nineteen-year-old Chris Cander is studying abroad in Madrid when a stranger locks her inside his car and drives her far outside the city. Alone in an abandoned industrial area with a knife pressed to her neck, Chris realizes the man intends to kill her, and decides "I'm not going to die like this." In this remarkable story of survival, Chris reveals how one terrifying night has quietly shaped the strong, fearless life she built afterward.

For information and resources related to mental health, domestic and sexual abuse, child abuse, and human trafficking, go to ElizabethSmartFoundation.org

We seek to bring hope, empowerment, and change in the fight against sexual violence.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

After 18 harrowing hours of captivity, Kara Robinson leads police back to her abductor's apartment — where they discover evidence connecting him to the unsolved murders of three young girls. Kara learns she didn’t just escape a predator; she escaped a serial killer.  In the finale of her story, Kara reveals what happened when her kidnapper was finally cornered, and why surviving the crime was only the beginning of learning how to live beyond it.

For information and resources related to mental health, domestic and sexual abuse, child abuse, and human trafficking, go to ElizabethSmartFoundation.org

We seek to bring hope, empowerment, and change in the fight against sexual violence.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Fifteen-year-old Kara Robinson is kidnapped at gunpoint in broad daylight and taken to her abductor’s apartment. Trapped with a man who seems to have planned every detail, Kara begins making a plan of her own — studying her surroundings, memorizing anything she might be able to use against him, and waiting for the moment he lets his guard down. In Part One of her story, Kara reveals how she survived 18 terrifying hours of captivity and made a daring escape, that would ultimately uncover something even more horrifying about the man who took her.

For information and resources related to mental health, domestic and sexual abuse, child abuse, and human trafficking, go to ElizabethSmartFoundation.org

We seek to bring hope, empowerment, and change in the fight against sexual violence.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hosted by famed abduction survivor turned advocate Elizabeth Smart, The Survivor Files is a true crime podcast featuring firsthand accounts from ordinary people who were thrust into impossible circumstances.

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