I believe she was a victim, even though she eventually cooperated with her kidnapper, but she did nothing special.

  I know I shouldn't be surpised by the number of people attacking the victim of this violent crime and her family;  after all there are always cruel, judgmental people who blame the victims, and have been for years.  However, that fact does not justify that behavior.  When a kidnapped victim, by the grace of God, makes it home alive they are punished by people who just want to spread gossip and lies, and people who think they should be told every detail of what happened to the victim just because they are curious.

In the case of Elizabeth Smart there is overwhelming evidence proving she was kidnapped by Brian Mitchell and his psychotic wife Wanda.  That she spent the first few months of captivity chained, like a dog, to a tree with a wire cable, lived in a well hidden dirt hut, and was kept quite by a man with a knife saying he would kill her and all of her family if she said a word.  This man who had been able to break into her house in the night, and forced her to leave with at knife point; a man who soon after tried to kidnap her cousin.  Elizabeth was stripped of everything that would link her to her life, home, and family. She was forced to keep a diary denouncing anything to do with her old life and family, and only writing what she was told to write talking about her "new life" with him.  He even showed her newspaper articles talking about how the search for her was going nowhere, and that there was no leads; later it talked about how many were sure she was dead.  He used these articles was emotional abuse, and telling her being married to him and the kidnapping was God's will, otherwise, he said, God would have allowed her to be found.  This was just one of many was he used to brainwash her.  Also, if she was a typical teenager who was running away from home, and planned to stay gone for so long, don't you think she would have taken a whole lot more than just the PJ's she was wearing?  Most teenage girls would have had to have some clothes, make-up, hair care products, and some money...she took nothing.

As for those who think Ed Smart talking to the press and writing a book about what had happened is "fishy" I ask you to think of this.  Their daughter is being accused of running away because she was pregnant, or was tired of all the family rules and just wanted to be free to have some fun, and other discusting comments, I can understand a parent wanting to defend their child who had just gone through nine months of hell on earth.  They probably were hoping it could shut some people up.  They also knew how lucky they are to have their daughter back, many people who have had a child taken from them are not that lucky.  Maybe by coming out and saying just that and talking about it might help raise even more awarness on the hundreds of families waiting and praying to find out about their child.  I know I am going against what many have been saying, but I personally can't find any fault in either of those ideas.

Another thing people have either forgotten about, or didn't even know in the first place, is that it is a felony to file a false police report.  If the family made it look like a kidnapping for some reason, or if Elizabeth had just run away and then made up the kidnapping story and falsely accussed two people for it they would be the one's sitting in jail, not Brian and Wanda.  And if it was all made up why would Brian Mitchell be telling everyone Elizabeth was his second wife, that they had married at the campsite with no minister to perform the wedding, and no one else there besides Wanda.  Why would he have told everyone, they later came into contact with, that Elizabeth was his daughter instead of second wife or something like that. None of that help his current situation.

Elizabeth was carefully (and throughly) examined by a doctor who reported she was not, nor had she ever been, pregnant.  So to those who say she was you are basically calling that doctor a liar.  Why would any doctor risk losing his/her license to practice by lying to the police and medical review board by saying what he/she did regarding this issue.

As for mormons and how they are all so bad, this isn't true either.  I grew up in a town with a large mormon population.  When my sister and I were young our best friends lived across the street from us and were quite active memebers of the mormon church.  We spent most of our free time "hanging out" and playing with us, and our mom's were very good friends as well.  We had lots of "sleep-overs" at each other's homes, and spent all of our free time with them.  There was never one weird thing that happened.  Their mom knew our family was every active in our christian church, and we knew how they felt about their mormon faith so there was never a time when we said anything bad about the other's religion (except for one time when one of the younger kids...she was six at the time and I was eight...told me their religion was the only true one; when her mom heard about that she grounded her daughter for two weeks for saying that).  My high school class was about one-third mormon, and they were some of the kindness, caring kids in the entire school.  They never teased anyone, or did anything to try to hurt anyone.  They were great friends to everyone, even the friendless.  When I first started high school my parents wanted to go back to grad school so my dad could get his PhD in science and my mom could get her master of science degree in business education; so the two years we were gone we rented out our home to a mormon family (we just put an ad in the paper looking for anyone who would want to rent it, we didn't plan to have a mormon family stay there, that's just how it worked out).  There were several months when that family was having a hard time coming up with the rent, those months the church paid the rent.  That is just what they do for the members of their church members.  The church did something very nice and VERY helpful for us once, even though we have never been and will never be a part of their church.  A few years back my grandfather died.  He had been such a big member of the community who helped so many people for nothing in fees or in return, he just did them to do the right thing God would want him to do.  So we knew there were going to be a lot of people who would be coming to his service, and we knew our church could never fit enough people into it; the leaders of the mormon church knew they had the only place that would be big enough to fit all four hundred people (in a town that has only 1200 people in it), so they let us use there church for free.  These are the terrible people you all are talking about.  There are bad people who are mormons, but there are bad people who come from every church...it's the people, not the religion.

In my opinion, one of this countries biggest problems are the people who enjoy bring other people down.  People who make decisions abou

I really can't believe the number of raters saying this CHILD ran away or was pregnant she was a CHILD! a CHILD who was kidnapped by a clear disturbed man and his equally disturbed female sidekick! You conspiracy nuts will stop at nothing!

Something is not right with this story. I think she was more likely a run-a-way.

She was probably pregnant....was ashamed so she ranaway and because her parents didn't want anyone to know how pathetic they were as parents they told the whole story of her being kidnapped to make it look like they were innocent in the whole thing. In fact, the story changed so many times...it was like what was it...knife or gun? First of all, a homeless man most likely would not have either one of them (weapons). How else where they going to explain there spoiled rotten child. Got pregnant, ranaway, parents got embarrassed so they staged a kidnapping to make them look good. Also, the reward? Come on, if I was a rich man like him...don't you think you would have offered everything to have to make sure your daughter got home safe if that is what really happened?

Why, for a millionaire, 25,000 dollars if pretty much nothing in comparision to what he really could have offered. Oh, let us not forget his friend that works for the Deseret News...funny how the story pretty much just stayed in the state of UT. It was on the news for a few weeks but nothing like it was in UT.

If they were so sure that this homeless guy was the kidnapper then why did they try to accuse someone else and send them to jail where he died? Again, was it the garage door with a key or was it through the screen window? Oh, and if it was the window...why suddenly was there no footprints? If she was a mile away, didn't they cover all of the area around them....within 5 miles? I would be embarrassed if I was her roommate...in fact, I would ask to move out if I found out that she was. Also, if this was so much trauma for her why did she go on the news recently and tell Nancy Grace that she doesn't ever think about the events....and that she didn't want to talk about it either. Why not, because Elizabeth Smart is too afraid that everyone will find out the truth about what really happened for the 9 months she was gone? I can go on forever but you get my point.

How disfunctional is this household, really?  This smelled of something fishy IMO and the parents are the main fish.

she's great I love her

I hope things stay quiet for her because she is so young but most people in her situation dont live to tell about it so let her have her day.

Some mormons may be hardcore when it comes to getting pregnant, but they wouldn't stage a kidnapping to conceal it. If that were true, wouldn't her kidnappers say something to try to save themselves some jail time. Although I think her parents went a little too far with the book, and movie stuff. Something they should have just left alone.

Whatever was fishy about this case, and whatever we might think of it, she's just a kid and I don't really blame her for all media hype. There's still alot we don't know, but I think the parents do.

There was something fishy about this one to me. Gone for 9 months and the whole time less than a mile from her home? Suspicious. I'd be willing to bet, seriously, that she got pregnant. But her hard core morman parents didn't want anybody to know. So they staged a kidnapping. Think about it, 9 months.

Her and her parents need to be put up in a special home

Basing this on the facts at hand and not what some people assume, I think it's an amazing story. The fact that it ends with this girl coming home alive is worth five stars.

let me finally be able to say this about this whole elizabeth smart thing. something is not right and never in my opinion has been. how the hell did a man who couldnt even shoplift from a grocery store able to go into a home in the federal heights area of salt lake city that he was only in for a part of day almost a year before and kidnap a child without being detected and to leave no trace. forget the sisters story she changed it so many times until they came up with the good one. i could almost swear the father is involved. hes sure been riding the financial purse strings of this. i could almost bet some kind of politics is in the future. it makes me angry cuz my son saw her in her disguise and actually sat next to her in a park. he was upset cuz he didnt recognize her. he recognized mitchell on amw and then he realized who had sat next to. if this turns out to be something other than what it is i hope they all get what they deserve. one man lost his life and another man probably wishes he did after being publicly fingered as a suspect. as you can probably tell i am from salt lake city and this one hits close to home. i have so many points that i could share but we'd be here til next year

When it's revealed that this girl turned out to be a runaway, the stopwatch gods'll click off another week's worth of scornful media coverage, and THAT'LL be what buries this mish-mosh of excuses and convoluted details.

The only thing that can be said with relative certainty is that the facts of this case are distorted way out of proportion, and that nobody can really be sure exactly what happened, Ms. Smart included.

she is very brave.

Elizabeth Smart has THE STUPIDEST parents in the entire universe! Uh oh, daughter's gone missing! Who can it be? A.) Some guy we don't know B.) Some guy we don't know or C.) The homeless freak who was in our house yesterday? D'OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOY!!

I have no problem with this child, but her parents are an entirely different matter. In the months since their daughter's return, they have fashioned a ghoulish industry out of her ordeal. Their lust for the media glare and the cash that comes with it is repulsive. When Elizabeth returned, they pleaded for privacy, but a few months later they were trotting her out to be interviewed to promote their book. They are exploiting their daughter's suffering and making a commodity of her misery. They are beneath contempt.

I'm not sure what's wrong with her, but she had plenty of chances to get away if she wanted to. Press blew the whole story out of proportion, she was held captive by some hippy who took her to parties and social events...there is just something not right with the whole story.

Same thing as Jessica Lynch: she is only well known for being a strong girl. Good for her!

She had dozens of chances to run away from her captors (including the time the guy was in jail!), but she didn't. She was seen at a packed party where she could easily have disappeared into the crowd, but she didn't. At age 14, if I were kidnapped, I'd have had at least five possible escape plans going through my head an hour in. But Elizabeth was so sheltered that she wouldn't have tried to make a break for it if her captors were sprawled on the cabin floor dead! There are five year olds who have handled kidnapping situations better than this.

What a hottie! Obviously a scarred girl though. Maybe if her parents hadn't spent their entire lives whoring themselves out in persuit of the holy $ and spent more time with their lovely daughter she would have turned out a bit more 'normal'? If I were her I wouldn't have wanted to come home either.

I'm assuming there's nothing particularly bad about Elizabeth Smart so she gets a four-star rating of GOOD from me. I'm only on this one because it seems quite bizarre to rate Elizabeth Smart. Just thought I'd give it a try. Now I'm imagining her walking down from that hill behind the house only to be met by a crowd of people flashing star-filled rating cards. If displeased, would she have abruptly turned and stomped back up the hill to join if I were a carpenter and you were my laaayyydeh (would you marry me anyway, would you help-me-kidnap-this-little-mormon-chick?)? Damn, I really thought this whole kidnap-victim thing would rank at least FIVE stars! If that's what it takes to gain fifteen minutes of fame, count me out!

Elizabeth ran away from the beginning and the parents just wanted publicity to sell their home. The story kept changing from gun point to knife point. They had to make the story appear real because of whom she was with. They are charging the poor guy and girl that they claim kidnapped them because they don't have any money to protect themselves or even win the case. She had all the time in the world to come home if she ever wanted too. Homeless people get blamed for it all because she is a white girl with a rich dady and I feel that she ran away because she was tired of being home and then when she decided that she was tired of being away she came back home and made up the whole story....the story has never been the same from the very beginning...it was changed as they went along.m e-mail me with your thoughts at junkfolder123@hotmail.com

I dont love her or hate her...I am glad they found her alive, but I have to wonder if she would've gotten the attention if she would've been: a minority like the girl in Milwaukee: poor: or not a blond blue cherubic child.

I live in Utah so as someone who lives in a state where this happened I saw something about her on the news everyday. Yes there was a lot of press about it, part of it was because she was white, but really why rant because she got so much attention. Every child should get as much attenion as her in that situation. But for people to doubt that she went through a horriable ordeal is sad. She was taken at knife point, chained in the wilderness by her captures. Children are able to be brainwashed or bullied by fear for there loved ones into staying in a bad situation. This girl has had to suffer and people mock her, her parents and the midea. These people need to look at the big picture. At least we didnt find her raped and mutilated in a ditch. As for the mormon bashing........how sad and boring to knock on a religion that most of the people dont understand. Im not a mormon but my sister and brother are, it is not cultish and doesnt make them creepy. They just follow a certain path like everyother religion.

Elizabeth Smart is a national hero. It was a miracle that they found her, let alone alive. I can't even begin to imagine the pain she went through. The story was gobbled up when the war began.

Okay, for all you mormon bashers, here is a real life mormon for you... We aren't wierd (proof: On average you socialize, having an actual convorsation, not just hi, with at least 2 mormons a day, actual study done by Harvard University) we don't have some sort of cult, we aren't racist, we just do what we think is right, we don't bash Baptists, Jews, Muslims, etc. So what gives you the moral-right to bash us? Elizibeth is a remarkable girl, and I praise her for being so strong. She did try to escape, but she was constantly under threats. I can't believe what some of you are saying. For the person that asked What makes her so special? What I have to say to that is what made Samantha Runyon so special... or the Sniper Cases so special... shootings happen everyday!So don't try to pull that! Daniell Van Dam got kidnapped, what was so special about her? It was the press that chose to pick up the story not the Parents. The parents kept the story out there, that's all. Reality check! Yes, kids do get kidnapped every day, but not 14 year-olds, that doesn't happen often, but unfortunatly it did this time. Excuse her parents for trying to share their story! I know this is random, but Mormons aren't Polygamists we renounced that in the late 1800s, anyone who tells you differently are wrong, and not all people in Utah are mormons. One last thing, yes this is random too, we are not a cult! If you would maybe actually talk to a mormon you would actually know what you were talking about... Mormons are humans too.

I was one of the ppl that prayed for her return. I was so happy when she was found.

Needs to be bent over a knee and spanked...good. Is not without fault in all this mess. I wonder..if her name were Shamika would we even care? Nah...wouldn't have even made the news...

I find the whole thing very fishy. I have a hard time believing that girl had no opportunites to escape or get some form of help. She was in public constantly...and the thought of brainwashing? Please, even the media's confused. Plus there's something not quite right about her parents. They just strike me as odd too.

An innocent victim of a terrible crime. I was very delighted when she was rescued, although I was confident that justice would prevail in the end. Now, if the media would just let her be, all would be just fine...

I agree with what many others are saying about how fishy this whole thing is. AND NOW! The parents are claiming that her safe return was a reward from God for following the Mormon faith. Wow! Anyway, like someone else said, would this story have gotten the same media attention had it been a LaKretia or TaMeka? A poor child? Ed & Lois were able to stay in the lime-light because (1) they are bizarre Mormons, (2) they are rich, & (3) Elizabeth is a blonde haired, blue eyed white girl. And, to echo other sentiments, why did she specifically say, "I'm not who you think I am. I'm not that Elizabeth Smart girl." ?? Odd...all unsettling.

A very sad story. She is a victum and a survivor, plain and simple!

Poor girl. She had to suffer so much. I feel bad for her. She was probably raped or molested.

UPDATE ! I am just glad she is safely back home with her parents and family. It is always a travesty when a child is either abducted or runs away from home. :(

wtf? kids everyday get kidnapped so what makes her so special? because she's a rich white girl?

I dunno about this girl.....She seemed really happy to be with those kidnappers.

I'm shocked at some of the comments here. Blaming this kid for what had to have been a hellish nine month ordeal? Come on, no matter how bizarre you may think Mormonism is, (I for one have had lots of experience with them and have never met more twisted, robotic people elsewhere), to say she went willingly is shameful. This was a kid. A sheltered, innocent child. What these mentally ill monsters put her through apparently amounted to brain-washing as well. Ever read Every Secret Thing, by Patricia Hearst? It painstakingly explains the process of her captors morphing from enemy to friend to protector. Give this girl a break. She was a victim, black and white. That she made it home is a miracle. She has a long road ahead of her. Don't make it longer!

I agree with Moose on this one. There is something very odd about this bizare event that has never quite jelled. It's not that being happy is bad, it's just that they are smiling so much with such plastic, Brady Bunch enthusiasm that it smacks of overcompensation to me. I won't even get into how screwed up the secretive, racist, cultish Mormons are.

This one is very, very suspicious. From what I read in the newspaper, she wasn't kidnapped as much as she ran away from home. And she apparently wasn't such an unwilling victim if she hung around for so long. Actually, she probably got off on the sick perversion she supposedly "suffered through." But these Mormons are very strange and disturbed people, so her story isn't that compelling or special at all.

It really is good to finally get some good news in this country after the events of the past months which have divided this country so deeply. It is indeed a miracle that she was returned to us safely after being away from home for nine months. God Bless her!

Who can't feel good about her? The curious side of me wants to know more about what happend to her. I don't think much is really known yet.

Hey, what can you say, she defied the odds that weighed so heavily against her. Welcome home, Elizabeth.

I am glad she was recovered and reunited with her parents. I wish a lot more missing persons cases could end that happily. Of course, no child should have to go missing in the first place.

When I had first heard about her safe return, I was absolutely amazed. Being gone 9 months, how many people are brought home alive? I wish her and her family well, and pray that she heals from this experience, as I am sure that it was traumatic for her.

I too am very glad she's alive. As a mother of two girls, I can't imagine what kind of pain her parents went through. That said, there is just something unsettling about this case. Something isn't right, like why did she deny who she was when the police found her? Was she that brainwashed?

I will give her a great because I am so glad that she was found alive. I hope that the press and everyone else leaves her alone and give her that time to heal and get back to a regular life. It is hard to even think about what those sick people put her through for those nine months. I just wish her and her family well.