Jayme Closs reunited with family as alleged abductor awaits kidnapping, murder charges in Wisconsin

Jayme Closs has been reunited with family and her alleged abductor is expected to make his first court appearance Monday where he will be formally charged with kidnapping and murder, Barron County Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald said on Friday.

Fitzgerald said the 13-year-old was reunited with her aunt Friday afternoon. Her grandfather said on Saturday he was able to spend a few hours with Closs as well. He said no one pressed her to talk, adding that FBI agents and doctors advised them to let her speak when she’s ready. He said she was largely silent and did not talk about how she was confined.

“She is doing as well as the circumstances allow,” Sheriff Fitzgerald said at an afternoon news conference. “I have not personally seen or spoken with her yet, which I am anxious to do.

“Jayme is the hero in this case, there’s no question about it,” he added.

Jake T. Patterson, 21, will appear at 3:30 p.m. local time on Monday in Barron County Circuit Court, where he will be charged with kidnapping and two counts of first-degree intentional homicide for allegedly gunning down Jayme’s parents in the early morning hours of Oct. 15, then taking her.

Fitzgerald said investigators found a shotgun at the rural Wisconsin home where Patterson was allegedly keeping Jayme that was consistent with what was used the morning her parents were killed. They’re awaiting lab analysis to confirm that it’s the same weapon. Other weapons were found in the home, he said.

Attorneys for Patterson called the affair “a very tragic situation” on Saturday and said they were relying on the court system to treat him fairly.

Fitzgerald again noted that Patterson “took great efforts to minimize his forensic footprint at the crime scene,” including shaving his head so as not to leave hair behind. He reiterated that Patterson had no relationship to the Closs family, but did not know why he chose Jayme as his target.

“Nothing in this case shows the suspect knew anyone at the Closs home or at any time had any contact with anyone in the Closs family,” Fitzgerald said. “The suspect had specific intentions to kidnap Jayme and went to great lengths to prepare to take her.”

Fitzgerald said Patterson was not at the Gordon, Wis. home where he had been living when Jayme escaped, and they believe he was looking for her when he was arrested.

Jayme was located several miles outside Gordon, about an hour’s drive north of her home, late Thursday afternoon, and Patterson was quickly pulled over in a car nearby and arrested without resistance thanks to a vehicle description the teen provided, Douglas County Sheriff Tom Dalbec said during a Friday morning news conference in Barron.

Jayme appeared bedraggled and thin Thursday afternoon after escaping her captor and seeking help from neighbors in a remote area several miles from Gordon.

At the Friday morning news conference, everyone from law enforcement and others who spoke during a news conference praised the teen for surviving, escaping and providing the key piece of information that led to the arrest of the man believed responsible for fatally shooting her parents and keeping her captive and undetected for weeks.

“We needed a break in this case,” said Justin Tolomeo, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Milwaukee Division. “It was Jayme herself who gave us that break.”

Fitzgerald said Patterson acted alone, targeted Jayme specifically and was in his jail Friday.

“It’s amazing, the will of that 13-year-old girl to survive and escape,” Fitzgerald said.

District Attorney Brian Wright said he does not believe Patterson, said to be unemployed, had any previous contact with the Closs family.

Patterson was hired at Jennie-O Turkey Store in Barron three years ago but quit the very next day, according to Steve Lykken, Jennie-O Turkey Store president. Jayme’s parents — James and Denise Closs —worked at the company for 27 years.

Lykken said Patterson quit after being hired, saying he was moving from the area. “He has not been employed with Jennie-O since then,” Lykken said in the written statement.

Jayme’s grandfather Robert Naiberg said in a telephone interview Saturday that the only thing the family knows for sure is no one knew Patterson. He said that Jayme told FBI agents she didn’t know him at all.

“He didn’t know Jayme, he didn’t know Denise or Jim,” Naiberg said. “(Jayme) don’t know him from Adam. (But) he knew what he was doing. We don’t know if he was stalking her or what. Did he see her somewhere?”

Fitzgerald said Friday morning that Jayme had been cleared from the hospital and was in the midst of undergoing mental and physical evaluations, questioning by the FBI and detectives before being reunited with her family.

Fitzgerald said Patterson has no criminal history in Wisconsin or the Gordon area and “was not on our radar.” Patterson does have ties to Barron, Fitzgerald said, but did not say what those ties were.

Diane Tremblay, the superintendent of the school district where Jayme attended class, told the morning news gathering, “There is so much love and hugs in our district today. It’s just insurmountable.

“We want to thank Jayme for being so courageous and finding the opportunity to come back to us. What an extraordinary young lady.”

The community of 3,400 residents was already showing signs of celebrating Friday, as the sign in front of Barron City Hall had already been changed to read “Welcome Home Jayme,” The Leader-Telegram in Eau Claire, Wis., reported.

“Everyone is just ecstatic,” city lineman Jeremy Schlosser told the paper, who was fixing the sign Friday morning. “I guess they stopped the basketball game (Thursday night) to announce it.”

Barron Mayor Ron Fladten said “I was blown away — that was the initial reaction.”

“The community has handled this whole thing very well,” Fladten said. “Boom! A miracle occurred. It’s a lot to process. It’s almost unbelievable. There are so many cases with sad endings, so it’s a lot to absorb.”

“It’s a miracle,” said resident Ron Wheeler as he ate an egg-and-ham breakfast at the counter of Seasons Cafe. “Everybody thought she would never come back.”

Jayme had not been seen or heard from since her disappearance in the wee hours of Oct. 15. Several intensive searches took place in the area in the days that followed, but none yielded any valid clues, and for weeks Fitzgerald kept saying authorities had no new leads.

According to the Douglas County sheriff, Jayme escaped east of Gordon at 4:43 p.m. Thursday, and Patterson was arrested minutes later. She was examined at a hospital late Thursday in the Duluth-Superior area.

Jeanne Nutter was walking her golden retriever, Henry, Thursday afternoon when she saw a girl walking toward her. As the girl got closer, Nutter knew almost immediately that she was Jayme by the photo that had been all over the news for months and plastered on posters in businesses fronts.

The girl was wearing slacks and shoes that obviously weren’t hers, a baggy coat or sweatshirt.

“She was so calm, so I tried to keep my composure,” Nutter said Friday.

“The first thing she told me was, ‘I’m lost and I don’t know where I am and I need help.’ “

She and the girl headed to a nearby house, where Kristin and Peter Kasinskas live. “This is Jayme Closs! Call 911!” Nutter told the couple.

Jayme was quiet, her emotions “pretty flat,” Peter Kasinskas said.

Jayme didn’t know anybody had been looking for her and was surprised the couple knew Patterson’s name. Jayme said she didn’t know him before he abducted her.

“‘He killed my parents and took me,'” Peter Kasinskas said he recalled Jayme saying.

Jayme told the couple that other people had been at the house during the time she was held there, but Patterson kept her hidden.

Jayme said that Patterson was gone at the time she escaped but said he would return at midnight.

Peter Kasinskas said that he and his wife didn’t ask Jayme questions about the details of her captivity.

“We did not want to ask too many questions other than to get the police there and get her safe,” Peter Kasinskas said. They wrapped Jayme in a blanket and offered her food and drink. She didn’t want anything but played with the couple’s puppy.

When police called to say that Patterson was returning to his house, the couple got the kids downstairs. The police had him within five minutes, the couple said.

The sparsely populated area where Jayme was located is a cluster of about 30 homes originally built around 50 years ago as cabins near the Eau Claire River. Most of the homes are unoccupied during the winter months. The land is hilly and heavily forested. Many homes are set back among trees.

Before dawn Friday in Barron, the Dairy Queen sign was flashing, “Welcome home Jayme. Thank you for bringing her home.”

“It’s like a dark cloud has been hanging over our head for about 88 days,” Fladten said.

Liz Sawyer, Mary Lynn Smith, Karen Zamora and Matt McKinney and the Associated Press contributed to this report