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Elizabeth Smartis speaking out about the release of one of her kidnappers.
In a speechat Pennsylvania’s Lock Haven Universityon Wednesday, the 30-year-old sexual assault survivor and child safety advocate discussed how she plans to continue living her life now that Wanda Barzee, 72, is free.
“There’s nothing anyone can do to you to change your worth as a human being. If you can’t believe that for yourself, believe me,” Smart began, addressing a room of about 600 people. “My past has no bearing on my happiness now, no bearing on the choices I make now.”
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“I’m not gonna let these people or this woman stop me from living the life that I want to live, and that’s how I still feel,” Smart said.
In 2009, Barzee pleaded guilty to the 2002 kidnapping of the then 14-year-old Smart. Brazee was sentenced to 15 years in prison, after which she began serving a state sentence in a related attempted kidnapping case.
She was meant to be behind bars until 2024. However, the Utah state parole board ruled the time she spent in federal prison, in jail awaiting trial and hospitalized prior to her plea all counted toward her sentence.
Elizabeth Smart/Instagram
Smart also spoke about seeing her captors in court for the first time, eight years after her rescue. “I didn’t know how I was going to react,” Smart recalled. “[But] when I saw them in court, I realized that they didn’t have any hold over me anymore, and they couldn’t hurt me or take away my life anymore.”
She also gave advice to fellow survivors about staying strong — “Find your piece of hope,” Smart said — and what it means to forgive.
“Whether or not I say that I forgive [my captors] will never make a difference to them, but it will affect me,” theWhere There’s Hopeauthor explained. “If I stay angry at them… then I’m not living my life 100 percent… I refuse to allow these people to steal more of my life away from me.”
Last week, Smart spoke publiclyat a news conference asking authorities to reconsider Barzee’s release.
“Wanda Barzee saw me as her slave. She called me her ‘handmaiden’ and she never hesitated to let her displeasure with me be known,” Smart said.
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“I do believe she is a threat,” she continued. “She is a woman who had six children and yet could co-conspire to kidnap a 14-year-old girl, and not only sit next to her while [I was] being raped, but encouraged her husband to continue raping me.”
The next day,Smart posted on Instagram about Barzeealongside a picture of what looks like her 14-year-old self, writing: “Only a couple months ago I was informed one of my captors, Wanda Barzee, would not be released until 2024. Now she will be released in less than a week. I find this news greatly disturbing and incomprehensible. In my efforts to learn more it seems there are no viable legal options open to me at this time.”
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She added, “As someone who has experienced first hand just how depraved she truly is, I believe her to be a threat and a danger not just to myself but to the community, any vulnerable person… I lived in absolute fear and terror for nine months, no matter the outcome I will not do so again.”
source: people.com
