Netflix's true crime documentary 'Abducted in Plain Sight' has been hailed as a 'masterpiece' while leaving viewers 'absolutely horrified'. The film, which arrived on the streaming platform in 2019, chronicles the abductions of Jan Broberg, an Idaho child who was taken by neighbour Robert Berchtold on two separate occasions during the 1970s.
The documentary features interviews with Jan herself, drawing from the account detailed in her memoir 'Stolen Innocence: The Jan Broberg Story'. Jan endured sexual abuse and abduction at the hands of Berchtold, a family acquaintance they met at their local church in 1972. In 1974, he told the family he was taking her horse riding, but instead imprisoned the 12-year-old in his motorhome and travelled to Mexico.
Remarkably, Jan's family delayed contacting authorities for several days, concerned about causing distress to Berchtold's wife. The documentary reveals how Jan was manipulated into believing she had been taken by extraterrestrials and that she needed to bear Berchtold's child to rescue her family. Following five weeks, the FBI located Jan and Berchtold, though she remained too frightened to reveal the abuse she had suffered.
Berchtold served a brief stint in prison for kidnapping, but it later emerged that he had manipulated both of Jan's parents into sexual encounters prior to the abduction. He then used this leverage to coerce them into signing affidavits granting him permission to take Jan to Mexico. Upon his release, Berchtold returned to their community and resumed his abuse under the guise of an alien conspiracy.
In 1976, when Jan was just 14, Berchtold kidnapped her again, taking her to California where he enrolled her in a Catholic school, posing as both her father and a CIA agent. This second abduction lasted several months before the FBI intervened. Viewers have been left horrified, with one Reddit user saying it 'made me rage' and another calling it 'absolutely horrifying'. Filmmaker Skye Borgman described the interviews as 'brutal', noting the emotional toll on everyone involved.
