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Crime, conspiracy, serial killers, cults, and murder.
All things that I love to consume, and I know you do too, you sick beautiful, intellectual-minded freak.
And today, we have a very special... special episode.
I think my favorite episode of these deep dives so far, because we are actually going to be talking to the person that went through this heinous, unimaginable crime and getting her point of view.
And this individual is Kara Robinson Chamberlain.
She has an absolutely harrowing yet inspiring story about survival against unimaginable odds.
At just 15 years old, Kara was abducted by a serial killer.
But with her quick thinking and insane courage, she was able to escape and eventually identify her captor, which she would later find out was a serial killer.
And our conversation was so informative and interesting, and I want to thank Kara again for doing this interview.
She is such a wonderful, inspiring human being and, without further ado, let's get into the interview with Kara Chamberlain.
Hello everyone, How are you?
And it's Chamberlain?
Yeah.
Lane?
Lane?
I don't know.
I don't know.
Chamberlain.
Chamberlain.
I don't know.
Either way, one of my last names is Hallowell, but I don't know if it's Hallowell or Hellowell, or I don't know.
Anyway.
Anyway.
Um, I yeah, I've just.
I mean, I do all these true crime deep dives and I always talk for the person that went through it, or anything.
So thank you so much for, for meeting with me and telling your story through your eyes.
Um, cause it's, it's, it's indescribable.
Like I I've read about it a lot.
Um, and there's only so much you can get from reading about it, but it's uh yeah, it's unimaginable and i just i really want my audience to hear it through your voice.
So, if you're okay with it um, you can intro yourself and just kind of get into how it all, how it all went.
I do want to start just by saying, like i know, when people hear this story, the first thing people think is oh my god, i could never do that.
And i just encourage everyone listening to listen With the understanding that you absolutely have no idea what you are capable of and what you can and would do in a situation like mine or many others, until you're put in them.
It's the human will is to survive.
So in that vein when I was 15 years old, the kind of flyover version of my story, and we can go into as much detail as you want.
Yeah.
The flyover version is when I was 15 years old, I was kidnapped by a man I later found out was a serial killer.
So I was very much like average 15 year old.
This was 2002.
So 22 years ago, i was spending the night with a friend and, as most 15 year olds do always with, like my friend, my boyfriend similar situation, as most people find themselves in at that age and had spent the night with my, my best friend, and we were getting ready to figure out what we were going to do for the day, decided to go to the lake and called her mom, asked if there was anything that needed to be done at the house and her mom said yeah, can you guys water the plants before you leave?
And so my friend wanted to take a shower before we left.
And so I was like, you know, I'll water the plants, kind of get us out of the house a little bit faster.
And so that was a decision that really changed my life.
And i was outside in like cheerleading shorts i don't, are you old enough to to the sophie shorts, oh yeah yeah, it was like i wore them in volleyball and stuff like really like just horrible shorts.
Are they still around?
I don't know?
No, i don't, and where?
Sorry, where was your friend at the time?
During this as well?
She was in the shower.
She was in the shower, yeah.
So she got in the shower and so i went outside and like the cheerleading shorts and t-shirt from like my mom's work, right.
Like car dealership t-shirt and my cheerleading shorts and no shoes, no cell phone.
Did I have a cell phone?
That's one of the things that people, where was it?
Why, why didn't you have your cell phone?
I'm like, Oh baby.
So, uh, so it was outside watering the plants and 15 getting ready to get my license.
So it's kind of paying attention to cars a little more than maybe I would have previously.
So when a Trans Am drove by, I was like, that's a kind of cool car.
Like maybe I would like to drive one of those and noticed it.
And you know, if it would have been a civic or or, you know, Kia Rio, I probably wouldn't have noticed it, but I noticed it and it was on the way out of the neighborhood.
And um, kind of cataloged it and went about my business and then, next thing that i knew, the car came back into the neighborhood and pulled directly into the driveway and i was not.
I would.
I wouldn't say i'm necessarily naive or that i was naive, but i lived.
This was before it.
The internet was what it is today.
So i think that um, anyone that's like my age will understand this, but maybe some people that are younger won't quite get this mentality of not being creeped out or scared because true crime wasn't a genre.
Then we weren't consuming these stories and like, oh my god, somebody's gonna kidnap me.
That was not, that was not a thing.
And you it's like you didn't see it on the news you pretty much had America's Most Wanted and you had Unsolved Mysteries and you had cops like yeah, that's it and yeah and so.
So the car pulls into the driveway and I don't really think anything.
I think maybe this is somebody that knows my friend's mom and guy gets out.
He doesn't set off any alarms.
He's very average looking white male.
He's not acting furtive, like looking around trying to figure out if anybody's watching him, anything like that.
And he walks directly over to me and he has like a binder in his arms and he says I was out here and I saw you out here.
I'm distributing these magazines or pamphlets, something like that.
And yeah.
And he said, so I figured I'd stop and give them to you.
Are your parents home?
And during this whole interaction, he's a very respectable distance away.
He's not all up in my space again, not looking around.
And I was like, Oh no, my parents aren't, or this is not my house.
I said, this is not my house.
This is my friend's house.
And her house is in a neighborhood where the houses are relatively close together.
Like there's people driving up and down the street, there's neighbors mowing their grass and doing yard work.
Like there's always people around.
And so I had, you know, like a sense of security.
And so i said this is my friend's house.
And he said okay well, what about her parents?
Are her parents home?
And i said no, her mom's not here.
And he said okay well, i'll just leave them.
I'll just leave these and maybe you can put them inside and you can give them to her when she gets home.
I was like yeah, absolutely yeah.
So natural shift in the conversation for him to enter my personal space and, upon him entering my personal space, to hand me these items, he hands them with one hand and with the other hand, puts a gun to the side of my neck and says come with me.
And so that's if, if anyone is watching and they have experienced true fight or flight like that true autonomic nervous system, you know that you don't necessarily get to pick how you respond.
No.
And so um, My response, which I actually forgot for a long time, until I was going back through the reports, because I don't remember saying anything.
And going back through the reports, I went, stop.
And he's like, nope, you're going to come with me.
And to the outside observer it looked like this man had his arm around my neck, so he just had his arm right around here right, and the handgun was really small so couldn't see it.
So he walked me around to the driver's side of his car.
He opened the driver's door and put the seat forward and said get in.
And i looked in the back seat there's a large plastic container back there, like you would store off-season clothing or your christmas kind of yeah, like a plastic rubber made kind of container.
And um, I said where am I supposed to go?
He said, get in the container.
And so I did.
So I got in the container.
He loosely kind of set the lid on, put the seat back, got in the car, backed out of the driveway.
And so I I instantly, kind of intuitively again, my parents didn't.
This was.
I was born in the eighties.
Like our parents were not giving us any sort of like conversations like we have with our kids nowadays.
It's, I instinctually somehow knew what was going to happen.
I knew that grown men don't kidnap teenage girls for anything other than nefarious reasons.
And so I also knew that I instantly knew I'm going to escape.
So I had this envision. how this whole situation was going to play out.
And so I viewed the entire experience through that.
And so I said, when I escape, I'm going to need to know where I am.
And so I started paying attention to the turns.
So smart.
Yeah.
And again, it was instinctual.
Totally.
One of the things that people are kind of blown away.
Did your parents tell you to do this?
Right.
Not at all.
This was survival instinct.
Right.
And this is something that everyone really has.
Yeah.
So I was paying attention to the turns and pretty much knew where we were.
And then when I felt us get on the highway, I was like, okay, no way I'm gonna know where I am.
So what other things can I lock into my brain?
I don't know how they're going to be useful, but somehow they'll be useful.
Okay, I can memorize this serial number that's on the inside of this container.
I can figure out, I can listen to the radio station that he is listening to and memorize that.
Like I can tell what time of day.
It is, just any little thing that I could remember to lend details to this story for when I escaped.
And so-
So he drove for a little while, got off the interstate, pulled over kind of, took the lid off and put a ball gag in my mouth and told me to scream as loud as I could.
And he said, OK, good.
Kind of put the lid back on.
Yeah.
And then drove for a couple more minutes.
I know.
I know.
And now I have children and I'm just.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
It hits different.
Of course.
Of course.
And I have a daughter now.
I have sons and recently had a daughter.
And so it's it's different now.
Absolutely.
But he drove for a couple more minutes and parked the car.
He said, I'm going to get out of the car and you have to be quiet.
And he came back after a minute or two and picked up the container with me in it, carried it a couple steps, set it down and drug it.
And I could tell it was being drug over concrete.
And then I could feel it go up over a threshold to what was what I found out was his apartment.
And so that began an 18 hour ordeal where I was with this stranger.
I was His victim of opportunity.
I eventually found out that I was just kind of in the wrong place at the wrong time, to be quite honest.
So he wasn't stalking you at all?
Not me.
He was the kind of person who did stalk victims.
And he actually tried to approach a couple of other girls that day and was unsuccessful.
And so I just happened to be there.
And nobody was on the street.
Right.
Well, the neighbor was in the backyard and saw me get in the car.
And... he, I wasn't kicking or screaming.
So he said, well, it looked like she was going willingly.
This is the kind of car.
And this was at the inception of Amber alerts.
And so this would have been a perfect opportunity for an Amber alert, but it wasn't really widespread like it is now, because they knew what the man looked like.
They knew what the car looked like, but I was.
When my friend got out of the shower and she saw that I wasn't there, she called her mom, she called my mom, she called my boyfriend and no one knew where I was.
So obviously they contacted law enforcement, who then talked to the neighbor and they were like, oh well, she must have gone willingly.
She must be a runway okay, and no, they didn't take plates or anything, because that wasn't really a right.
No no, my god, nothing.
And how sorry, how long was that car ride, do you know?
Um, so now knowing about, how i know where i was um and where i was taken from so, probably 15, 20 minutes okay okay, i just must have felt like yeah, i can't even imagine it.
It was very surreal, it's.
You know, I find that whenever you're in these fight or flight situations, time is an illusion really.
Like it goes slow.
It goes fast.
It's like it's so weird.
Sometimes it feels like it's like slowed down and slow motion.
And so.
So, yeah.
So I was in his apartment for 18 hours and.
During those 18 hours, I was sexually assaulted multiple times.
He told me, when I'm done with you, heavy air quotes, when I'm done with you, I'm going to take you somewhere where you don't know where you are.
I'm going to let you go.
And then it's your decision if you go to law enforcement or not.
And you're always known as the girl who was raped.
That was like one of the things that he said.
Also, let's watch the news and see if anyone misses you.
Oh, my God.
Yeah.
And of course I wasn't on the news because I was a runaway and there wasn't an Amber alert.
And, but I knew, I knew that my family knew that I wasn't a runaway.
I knew they were worried.
And I also knew that at some point this person was going to let his guard down.
You can't be vigilant all the time.
And so everyone's heard fight or flight.
There's, there's, it's actually been expanded in the last couple of years to fight, flight, freeze.
And some people say appease, but I think fawn is a little more, or some people say fawn.
I think appease is more accurate because my, my response was exactly that to appease.
And so what that means for anyone who's like, I don't, I don't know what that means.
It's basically this if you think of two dogs interacting and you have one dog that's very much more dominant and more powerful, and then you have the other dog that's more submissive, and that dog kind of stays low, tucks its head,
It might show its belly.
It shows that it's not a threat so that it doesn't get injured by the more dominant dog.
So that's a perfect example of what appeases.
So for me, what that looked like is I'm going to go along with what he wants me to do.
I'm going to ask him if I can sweep his kitchen while he's making dinner.
I'm going to Have conversations with him.
I was able to remain very calm because a really cool thing that our brain does in trauma very often is it will shut down that emotional brain.
And it does that so that you can be very analytical.
So I could have a conversation with him and find out that he was in the military.
I could try to gather information from the magnets on his refrigerator that was his doctor and his dentist, to the animals that were in the apartment to when I was in the bathroom seeing feminine hygiene products and hairspray and a hairbrush with long red hair.
So I'm gathering all of this information to try to identify him or notice that there's these things in the bathroom that indicate that a woman lives here, at least in part, trying to gather all of this information for when i do escape, while i'm outwardly appeasing him and trying to remain calm because i knew at some point he's probably going to go to sleep and that's going to be my best, my best opportunity, and so that that proved to be true.
So he restrained me for bed and um, and he had given me a valium at that point, and so I fell asleep.
Um, I had handcuffs on my wrist that had a like a call it a.
It's a quick link, it's like a carabiner with like a screw clasp on it.
Yeah, so a quick link around the middle of the handcuffs that was attached to a rope that was tied to the frame of the bed.
And then I had a leg restraint on my right leg and that was attached to the foot of the bed.
And so, under all of those circumstances, I fell asleep for a few hours, not very long, woke up very early in the morning and recognized that this was it.
This was the moment that I had been waiting for, and he was never going to be more complacent than when he was asleep.
And so he was asleep in the bed next to me and I recognized I have to get my hands free first.
Squeeze my hands out of the handcuffs.
So I actually had to use my teeth to unscrew the quick link, slid my handcuff, the handcuffs up and out of that kind of shimmied down.
My leg disconnected, the leg restraint slid out of bed.
Um, I think I can't remember at what point I was eventually able to squeeze one of my hands out of the handcuffs.
And the front door was kind of barricaded, more or less.
There's just like a lot of stuff in the way.
Oh, God.
Yeah.
So he's literally this is a maybe 600 square foot apartment.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so the other side of the wall from the front door is his bedroom where he's asleep.
And then he's sleeping in a bed that's right next to a window that looks out on the front door.
And so I knew I had to be extremely quiet and I had one shot at this and somehow.
Kudos to adrenaline and God.
An angel, guardian angel.
Yes, I was able to move everything, unlock the door and throw it open all in one fell swoop.
And I just thought he's going to wake up.
He's going to grab the gun that's on his nightstand and he's going to look out the window and he's going to shoot me in the back.
And I thought, but that's okay because I'm out and somebody's going to find him.
At least he'll get caught.
And so I had straight up tunnel vision.
I looked around, saw a car driving across the parking lot and just ran out in front of it and flagged it down.
There were two men inside and I said I was kidnapped and I escaped from that apartment and I turned around and pointed to it.
And I said, remember that apartment because they all look the same.
Yeah.
And it was like a town or condo townhouse kind of situation.
Yeah.
Um, well is, uh, apartments like two story apartments.
Yeah.
Got it with exterior entrances, got it, and so i knew.
All i knew is it was a bottom left apartment and and they said okay, what do you want us to do?
Where do you want to go?
And i said, take me to law enforcement.
So so they take me there more or less, drop me off in the parking lot.
Oh what, they didn't come in with you, No.
Oh, were you scared?
Like, was it cause it was two men?
Were you like now in that situation where you were like uh, now I'm scared to get in a car with two men, or were you just like I wasn't something that I get asked regularly, because I think that would be a very normal reaction.
But no, I, at that point I was like, you're the only people out here.
Cause it's, it's very early, maybe like six.
Okay.
Yeah.
6 and 7 in the morning, so not a lot of people drive around.
Play the odds.
It's like, one shot.
Yeah, this happened once.
What's the chance of it happening again?
I would say it's not zero, but it's low.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Dark humor is a great coping mechanism.
Yeah, I understand.
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
No, sorry.
Sorry.
Continue.
No, it's okay.
So I run into the sheriff's department.
It's a region.
So like a substation.
So they're not like staffed 24 hours a day.
They're not really staffed.
Period.
It's just kind of like a place they can get together and meet.
And so get to the region and I'm running through and I hear a little voice, a little voice.
No, I hear I hear a voice say, ma'am, excuse me, can I help you, ma'am?
And go in there.
There's one deputy in there.
And I say, my name's Carrie Robinson.
I was kidnapped and I escaped.
And the two men that brought me in know the apartment complex and the apartment that I came out of.
And he said, OK, well, let's let's sit down.
Let's get your information.
We'll look you up.
Has trouble finding me in NCIC, which is the National Combined Index for Crime database.
So it's where they list missing cars, stolen cars, missing persons, et cetera.
And. having some trouble looking me up eventually finds me in there.
And he's like, okay.
Uh eventually, after I'm there for like 10 minutes, uh calls my mom and tells her that I'm there and she's on the way.
And he just, he, uh, lets an investigator know.
So the investigator is on the way and the investigator gets there and he he removes the handcuff from my other wrist and he says so we talked to the men that brought you in and they don't know the apartment that you came out of.
I was like, Awesome.
One job.
One job.
I did like a thousand things and they couldn't do that one.
Right.
One job, guys.
So do you think that if we go back, you could point out the apartment?
Like, I kind of doubt it.
Yeah.
But I'm willing to try.
And so get in the car with the investigator.
We go over there as expected.
They all look the same.
Yeah.
And, but we do see a man that's like a maintenance kind of man driving around on a golf cart.
And I say, Okay.
So it's a bottom left apartment.
These are the animals that are in the apartment.
This is what the inside of the apartment looks like.
This is what the man looks like.
This is the car that he drives.
And there's a woman with long red hair that lives there with them.
And he goes, I'm pretty sure I knew what apartment that is.
So instantly he's like, yeah, I'm pretty sure I know.
So I go back to the sheriff's department and my mom's there.
She takes me to the hospital to get a sexual assault exam done and while I'm there, investigators bring me a photo lineup.
So fairly quickly they're able to identify who he is and I immediately identify my captor and find out his name for the first time.
It's Richard Marka Bonnets, and he's obviously not at the apartment.
So I get the kit done, I go home, I'm giving statements, having all of these interactions with law enforcement over the next couple of days, and all I really know during that time is he is nowhere to be found.
I'm not getting a lot of updates, even though um, i i was always like 13, going on 30, i was always like very mature and i essentially gave them the information to like solve the case.
But i'm not getting updates really, and except we don't know where he is.
Uh, until One morning I wake up in the morning and find out that they not only found him but he's killed himself.
And so his sister more or less turned him in and a, an operation was set up in Florida.
So all of this happened in South Carolina.
He was going to meet his sister in Florida.
He somehow got spooked and I guess noticed that there was law enforcement there, led them on a police chase that ended in them deploying stop sticks, blowing out his tires and he shot himself.
So yeah, I was, I was immediately just, I was pissed.
I was like I did all of this and I, I wanted um, I wanted to sit in a courtroom and I wanted him to look at me and know that not only was he outsmarted by a 15 year old girl,
But that I was the biggest mistake that he ever made and that I was his downfall.
I wanted that that like justice that like in your face.
I'm not just the girl that was raped.
I'm the girl that was smarter than you.
Absolutely.
And I wanted him to know that his victim of opportunity was was just the worst decision that he ever made.
And so I was really pissed off for a really long time.
Yeah.
But eventually I realized that by him taking his life, I was spared a trial.
So there's certain details that would have come out in a trial of things that happened in the apartment that my parents, the media, my friends, my boyfriend never had to hear those details.
And so, so I was thankful for that.
And yeah, law enforcement, whenever they served the search warrant on his house, found some pretty disturbing information that led them to believe that he may be linked to some other homicides that were unsolved in Virginia.
So they immediately notified the task force for those homicides who came down, collected evidence.
And this all happened in June of 2002.
By August he was positively identified as the person responsible for Katie and Kristen Lisk and Sophia Silva in 1996 and 1997.
And so I effectually ended the career of a serial killer.
My belief is that he was responsible for much more.
And that was something that he more or less told his sister whenever he was on the run.
But as of today, he has not been connected to anything else, which is now the reason why I'm mad that he took his own life, because I genuinely believe that he would have confessed to other things that happened.
So for other people and everything.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So so that's.
I guess that wasn't.
Oh my gosh.
Um no that no, I think.
No, thank you so much for yeah saying all this sorry, continue no through that.
Um, I think that's the thing that most people want to hear about, that I find in these stories, the interesting things are not these things that someone else chose to do me.
Someone else chose to kidnap me, chose to sexually assault me and would have murdered me.
Yes.
That would have happened.
But I think the interesting thing in these stories and what really sticks with us and empowers us is what people do afterwards.
Absolutely.
And so, for me, I had many interactions with law enforcement and, Most notably, had I was kidnapped from one County and I was found in the neighboring County, or I escaped in the neighboring County.
So had interactions with two different law enforcement jurisdictions.
And one sheriff said 24 hours later was at my house and said well, you know, that guy was going to kill you, right?
Like, you know, you should be dead right now. which we didn't know at that time.
Right.
Like he was not identified as the person responsible for those homicides.
Um, but also like, was it necessary?
No.
Was it empowering?
Was it helpful?
No, it was, it was completely unnecessary to say that.
Um, yeah.
And then I have the County that I was recovered in, that I that actually handled the case that sheriff uh was like I'm so proud of you.
Like you are so brave.
He took me with him to give an award to the men that took me to the sheriff's department.
He gave me awards for bravery.
The next summer he called my mom and said do you think Kara would like a summer job working at the sheriff's department?
And so I did.
So I went doing administrative work and worked at the sheriff's department all through high school and college.
And he more or less became like another father figure for me.
Like he'd come and check my grades every semester.
He'd show up at my desk.
He'd be like, let me see your report card.
Oh, that's awesome.
Yeah.
He has, he has daughters.
And so I just became another one of those for all intents and purposes.
And so whenever it was time for me to graduate from college, he said well, you'll always have a job here doing whatever you want.
And he said um, do you want to be a school resource officer?
Because i was thinking about being a teacher.
I was going to change my major in my fourth year, of course, as one does you do, because you know i i was majoring in psychology, which tell me you have trauma.
Uh, just major in psychology or get therapy.
Yes oh, my goodness, i also did the psychology route and i went into teaching as well.
I understand.
Yeah.
I was literally like my senior year of college and I was like maybe I'll change to early childhood education.
And so he was like, you know, do you want to be a school resource officer?
And I was like, I'll try it.
Yeah.
And went to the Academy and found out that I loved it.
I grew up, I was tomboy.
And so I grew up like driving go-karts and, and doing all that stuff.
And so the Academy was just like the adult version of this.
And everybody wants it to be like this, this big beautiful story of like I wanted to have retribution and help people who went through things like me.
I'm like, i mean, i liked um driving cars yeah hey, whatever floats your boat.
Yeah, life you know, and and i and i essentially grew up there too, so it was a family for me, and so um, so went to work at the sheriff's department and worked there as a school resource officer and then transitioned to investigations, where i investigated sexual assault and child abuse cases And then eventually moved to victims advocacy.
And I worked as a victims advocate, a sworn victims advocate until the birth of my first child.
And and then just kind of put a pause on that and never went back and kind of transitioned what I do to doing keynotes and showing up on social media and this weird world that we live in now.
Yeah.
Hey, where did you meet your husband in there?
Out of curiosity.
I met my husband in law enforcement.
So, yeah.
So I met him working at the sheriff's department, which is a funny story.
It's like that we both worked at this agency.
We both had like a lot of things where we should have met at other times in our lives, like a lot of overlap, but met at the sheriff's department and uh, were married within a year, so just immediately, immediately knew and and so forever thankful to the sheriff because not only did he give me a career, a second family, like that's how i met my husband, that's the reason i have my children and and yeah.
So that's kind of the the flyover.
Yeah, It's like the transatlantic flyover.
Yeah, for sure.
For sure.
I mean yeah, it's hard to even.
I mean you read about it and then you can watch videos.
You can watch other people talk about it.
But then, I don't know, hearing it from you and then just like the point of view from you is so...
I don't know.
I want to say inspiring and also gut-wrenching, like listening to you.
And I'm sorry if it makes you kind of relive it.
I'm sure you've said this story so many times, so I really do appreciate you sharing it again.
But I think what you said is so impactful and important about survivors after the fact, because everyone focuses so much on just survivors, all the shit that happened
And then it's like okay, that's how they're defined, which is so not the case, because you're I mean, I've watched your content now and you're just doing so much other stuff.
It's so incredible.
And with your keynote speaking and everything like that, what are you doing with that?
So when I first started, it was more or less like, hey, come and share your story.
And it's always been as easy for me to share my story as I'm sharing it with you today.
And that's because of that dissociation, that shutting off the emotional impact of what was happening to me in the moment.
So I went and shared as much as I was asked.
And I did that up until I had my first son and realized I wanted to put a pause on that.
And I wanted to pause it because I was like, I don't really know why I'm sharing.
I'm sharing because people are asking.
And I was asked to be interviewed by Elizabeth Smart.
And I thought I would do that because I feel like she's not going to do to me what a lot of other producers and media sources have done to me, which is, um well, can you retell this part of your story, but put a little more emotion into it?
Um, right.
And, and so, yeah, it's, it's pretty horrific.
And so, um, So I was like, I'll do that interview.
And when I did that interview, I recognized that I was in a very unique position at that point that a lot of people don't get to be in, which is I was sitting across from someone who understood things that I didn't always know how to put into words.
And so that kind of became my why that I wanted other people to understand, be able to experience these positive things that I did.
And once you know your final destination, once you know your why, it becomes a lot easier to navigate there.
It's like getting in your car.
If you don't know where you're going, you're just going to drive around aimlessly, which was what I was doing.
And, and so, once I knew my why, I knew that I was going to be doing keynotes to educate, to inspire, to uplift.
And my favorite keynotes to give are always to law enforcement, because I think it's so important for law enforcement to know that they can make minor changes in the way that they speak to people and it can impact how someone views themselves.
If they identify as a victim, if they identify as a survivor, if they identify as someone who is defined by what happened but that's not defined.
And so I do that.
And I also share to nonprofits and just it's essentially anyone who I can share with.
It's still that, but really just keeping the central message of like going from being a victim to like this place of valor and and so it's it's, it's fun, it's one of the most rewarding things that I do.
Every time I do it, I've had a little bit of a break because I had a baby and congratulations, by the way, thank you, she's perfect and uh, took a little bit of a break and I'm like I'm ready.
I'm ready to do it again, because every time I do a keynote, I'm like this is this is what it's about, because I think if, if we can learn from other people's stories how to do better, then and especially how to empower people because, let's be honest, no one gets through their life without something difficult happening.
So like what does it look like to pick yourself up by your bootstraps and and not be defined by these difficult things that happen?
And and so that's kind of the backbone of what I do, but then do a lot of one-on-one advocacy work and and um social media.
Yeah.
Yes.
Who does that?
No, but it is, it is truly so impactful.
And what you said about the, what the two police officers said, said I think is so interesting because as soon as you said that, I was like like Right.
So heart wrenching.
Like how dare just the insensitivity.
And I've read so many cases where people or even belittled about like, well, it wasn't that bad.
Well, it was only this.
Right. which i i don't know if you've experienced yeah so only 18 hours oh my gosh like it's just only 18 hours because i escaped yes and it trickles down to to your event to other people to other people that have experienced a a rape or or any other sort of assault and it's just like it's it's not bad enough it's not this so it's just right because we're so desensitized right because there's so many horrific stories that we can consume at any given moment.
And, um, I know that like true crime is the number one, like fastest growing genre in media.
And I, I honestly don't know how people consume it at the rate that they do.
Like I, I don't personally consume it cause I've lived it.
Right.
Like I've lived it in two different realms.
I, lived it and I investigated it and I worked in it.
And so to me, I'm just it's just not something that's compelling to me.
But but I mean, and I also don't.
I don't know if things are done ethically and I can't consciously production, and so i recently consumed uh, two true crime docuseries that i knew were done ethically and or were about people that i personally know and um, i thought about it for for like a week.
It can?
They consumed my thoughts and i was like how do people do this?
Yeah, It's so hard.
No, you're right.
And people do get desensitized.
And for me personally, I mean, my mother was dateline cops.
That's all we watched as kids.
And then I went into criminology and psychology and all that.
And I think the psychological and aspect of I've had my own stuff happen.
And that aspect of it is very interesting, but also in the frame of mind of speaking to other victims and talking about people's stories and and bringing awareness to it.
Is is where i come from in that sense.
But there's there are so many people that just tell the story and they're like subscribe and end it up and it's like i should not subscribe, but okay, what?
Um yeah no, there is a very fine line and i think People need to be careful with how they go about it as well, which is a very, very good point.
And yeah, no, I think I think everything you do is so, so incredible.
And I also want to make sure that everybody knows where to find you as well.
So what what's what's your what's your plug?
What's your hand?
Yeah.
So I am all up on the Internet.
Yeah, I am.
I'm just like, no, I know you get it.
I totally get it.
It's it's when people are like, what is your job?
I'm like.
I hate, yeah, I make videos.
Like when I'm traveling, people are like, oh, I'm traveling for work.
And they're like, what do you do?
And I'm like, social media.
I'm a speaker because I was kidnapped when I was 15.
I'm like, why do you tell people that?
No, you can't.
Yeah.
It's so weird.
I have to have like an elevator pitch, which is like when I don't want to have that conversation.
Yes.
Yeah, so I am mostly on Instagram and TikTok, trying to branch into other things, but my handle in all of the places is Kara Robinson Chamberlain.
I have a website, Kara Robinson Chamberlain.
I host a podcast with my friend and fellow survivor, Kimberly Corbin.
It's called Survivor's Guide to True Crime because we felt like captive audience was maybe a little too dark as our podcast name.
So
We're like, it was a captive audience was the name.
That's amazing.
Yeah.
So we saved it for our Patreon.
We'll let the people who pay be our captive audience.
That's really good.
We're like, we got to capture those analytics.
So Survivor's Guide to True Crime is like our, you know, our public appearance.
And we're like captive audience.
We couldn't let it go.
No, that's great.
I love that so much.
Yeah.
And there's a movie about this whole endeavor as well.
There's a documentary.
There's a People magazine.
See it up there.
So whenever I met Elizabeth and I recognized that I wanted to do more keynotes, do more media, things like that, I realized that I needed something to point people to.
Like, here's my story.
Here's how you consume it.
And So I asked Elizabeth if she had a recommendation for a production company, which she did.
And so I worked with them and was an executive producer on my documentary which is escaping captivity, the Kara Robinson story.
And then, about a year later, someone approached me from lifetime and they asked if I want to do a movie, went back to my my friends at the production company and said here, I got this, I got this message and I've never really been interested in a movie, to be honest, because I don't like um, like recreations and jobs.
And I said, but I would trust you guys to do it because I know you're ethical.
I know that I would be involved, which is very important when survivors are telling their stories.
And so they were like, yeah, if you want to do it, like, let's do it.
And so went and did a movie and was, involved from the very inception to the end.
And that's called The Girl Who Escaped, the Kara Robinson story.
And so both of those are online.
They're both on Apple, I know.
And then the movie is on Hulu and it's all over the place.
If you Google it.
Yeah, for sure.
But I'm glad to hear it on Tik TOK.
Yeah, of course.
Of course.
Freaking Tik TOK.
Next to, um, ASMR videos of someone playing with like putty or something.
Um, don't even talk to me about ASMR, man.
I just went on a rant on Tik TOK about how much I hate us.
ASMR people eating ones.
Uh, i hate it so much.
It makes me physically mad like well, just do it my, my movie or my videos and it's, you know, like someone like brushing hair and i'm like this is weird.
It's just like put these things together.
No no, it's just yeah, tiktok's a horrible place and i could become very different and um, it's different.
Yeah, and navigating social media and stuff after, after all this has happened, how has that been?
How has it been?
Because it's a gross place.
Sometimes it depends on the day, to be honest.
Um, when i was kind of getting back into this, i knew that i i had to have a following, more or less right.
Like if I want to do a movie, if I want to do keynote speaking, people have to know who I am.
And so at that point, TikTok was just arriving on the scene.
And Instagram.
I was like I'm a little fish in a gigantic I mean in the ocean.
Basically Facebook YouTube again again, like old people, don't worry about that.
And then YouTube, again, like a tiny fish in the ocean.
And so I was like, but this TikTok thing might work.
And so started there and pretty quickly went viral with content.
And and began to make connections.
So I hate to be like an old timer, like, back when my day on TikTok.
You and me both, baby.
Me and me both.
But then it was just like this incredibly amazing supportive place which I'm sure you experienced then.
In its inception, there were no trolls.
There was no other place on the Internet like that.
And, and so I was making connections with people like I will never forget one woman that I shepherded her through my inbox into leaving a trafficking situation like that.
I talked to her through the entire process and like helped her leave and helped her find help and gave her the courage to to do something that was very, very difficult and made my one of my best friends in the world my podcast cohost.
I made a friend there, Kim Corbin.
Um, so it's.
It's been very interesting, and I think we are in this unique age where you can kind of the beauty of social media now is that the algorithm automatically serves your content to the people who need to hear your content.
And so so as long as I keep talking about it in in ways that help people, then they're receiving it.
And obviously um, through the movie it kind of blew up and um uh, the actress that played me, katie douglas, has a very much cult following and so so ended up with a ton of younger people, which has been different to me, to interact with them they they, you know, i shudder to think what it would be like if, if i would have been on tiktok at oh, i can't even imagine, i don't like to think about it.
I'm glad i was.
Well, there's like very young children on on tiktok and um yeah, and they're like yeah, i wasn't even born when this happened and i'm like yeah yeah, and with kid, having kids now, how old, how old are your kids?
My oldest, it will be 11 next month.
Okay.
So how do you feel with.
Oh, yeah.
Um, yeah, no, they can't have social media.
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, that's, that's, I mean, I'm kidless and I'm like, they'll never have it.
Right.
I'm like, no, they, they barely, like I have all of their stuff just locked down.
It's a scary world.
I think it is.
You know we we um, We think that I think the world is changing, but I think historically we have been afraid of, you know, the person with the free candy man, or you know with the missing puppy.
But really our children, if they're going to be a victim of a stranger assault, which is Fairly rare.
If they're going to be a victim of a stranger assault at this point, it's coming from online.
It's not coming from someone riding around looking for a victim of opportunity.
There's way too many cameras for that.
Yeah.
So, so realistically it's one of the questions I get a ton is what is parenting look like with your story?
And, and I think it's made me a more conscious parent.
I think there's a lot of, stuff that i maybe would not have discussed or i would have handled differently with my children because we're really big on consent uh it's you know oh you don't want to hug that person cool don't hug them uh we're really big on proper anatomical terms like my oldest he was two and he was like you have a vagina and i was like bro i do correct like way to go so So, you know, like, yeah, because we don't if there's ever a situation where, God forbid, my children are assaulted, I don't want there to be any confusion about what was touched and what was wrong.
And and we have very especially now that my, my boys are getting older we have very open conversations about like hey, your friends are on Roblox.
And the reason you're not on Roblox is because that's where predators live.
Absolutely.
Right.
A percent.
So many.
Yeah.
And they know like hey, I'm going to take a video of you doing something, maybe to tell a point, but I'm not going to show your face.
I'm not going to share your name.
I want to protect their privacy because I think that we are learning, or we will be learning, the implications of sharing thousands of images.
And when we talk about like AI deep fakes.
Oh, yeah.
I can't even think of the implications of sharing images of my children.
So we have a lot of very open conversations about kind of why we do the things that we do and And they know my story to like an age appropriate level.
Obviously at eight and 10, almost 11 my boys can't necessarily comprehend what a sexual assault is, but they know that someone took me from my mommy and daddy.
And that's why we have standards and we have rules, because we want to keep them safe, which I can't do my job and live in the same house with them and have you know, awards behind me.
I have to be open to all these things, obviously.
And I think that they're, they're better for that.
And ultimately I don't want my children to be victims.
And so I'm laying the groundwork for that, but I'm also trying to lay the groundwork for them to not be offenders.
Yeah.
I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah.
With having boys and you're just like, You can't not think about that, of course.
And obviously, I mean, it sounds like they're going to be like the most gentlemanly, respectful.
I hope so.
Some days I question.
8 and 11.
I mean, I'm sure they're just like little terrors at some points.
They're great.
But sometimes I'm like, oh, you might be a sociopath.
Yeah.
Yeah, you're looking for it constantly, I'm sure.
And everybody, I'm assuming, do you find that you overanalyze a lot of people that you meet?
I actually have a kind of funny story about that.
So I did a podcast conference.
I think it's podcast movement about a year and a half ago.
And I was there with Kim Corbin.
And we were talking to this guy that attended our session.
And after we stepped away, she was like, well, that guy was creepy.
And I was like, oh, he was?
She was like, oh, he had like major serial killer vibes.
And I was like, I don't pick up on those.
Yeah, i think we've established i don't pick up on serial killer vibes, so i didn't get those vibes.
You're just empathetic.
You just like like i don't know, he seemed weird.
I i guess, i don't know, he's probably a nice guy, he probably had a bad day.
She was like his.
His background photo was a photo of him and i was like yeah, that's kind of weird, that is weird.
She's like i saw his phone background and it was a photo of himself and i was like okay, that's pretty funny, that's pretty.
Yeah, but i don't pick up on those.
You just, you see the best in everybody or try to, i guess, give everybody the benefit of the doubt.
Yeah, i question like, is it trauma or is it autism on a regular basis?
Yeah, like I don't know.
I have no idea.
I might have a little bit of autism or it might just be trauma.
Who knows?
Who knows?
Who knows?
Yeah, that's fair.
My partner has autism as well.
And the way he navigates the world, the way I navigate the world are so different.
And he does that.
He's just kind of like, doesn't really look into anything as much.
He's just like, no, they're fine or whatever.
I'm like, they, and then me, I'm just like, I'm in the shit all the time. overanalyzing everything so it's not balanced is your husband similar or is he like uh he's uh he definitely has some adhd okay he was um he was in the military he was special forces in the military okay and he also um went on and did contract work and so he's like been and then working at the sheriff's department as well he's been exposed to like the worst of the worst so he kind of like thinks everyone is okay so you got that balance yeah he thinks everyone's negative so um and yeah it's it's funny whenever we talk about i'm like i'm pretty sure i'm autistic and he's like absolutely not there's no way you're autistic i'm like how often in a conversation do you think about eye contact and he was like what are you talking about yeah So never.
That's like 80% of my brain capacity in a conversation is how much eye contact am I making?
I'm like, hey, man, I mean, yeah, the spectrum.
I will like analyze this video with Carol.
How often do you think that about eye contact in a conversation?
And I guarantee you.
It's a big part of the mental capacity there.
It is.
No, he's always thinking about the best way to respond and it's overanalyzing social interactions to the max.
So, no, everything you're saying is on par.
I'm not going to diagnose you.
I'm diagnosed, but I'm pretty sure.
How about the ADHD?
I have a hat that says, Undiagnosed, but I'm pretty sure.
Pretty autistic probably.
Yeah.
I mean, honestly, what's the point in a diagnosis is my opinion.
It doesn't matter.
It doesn't make a difference in your life.
Everyone creates adaptations to get through life.
And I think everyone's a little neurotypical.
Like, I mean, not neurotypical.
Neurodivergent.
Neurodivergent.
I think everyone's a little neurodivergent.
When I meet someone that's neurotypical, I'm like... Yeah.
Yeah, you're weird.
What's your life like?
That's very bizarre, it's rough.
So, you know, is it trauma?
Is it neurodivergency?
It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter.
We all have to figure out how to get through our crap in our lives.
Yeah, and navigating yeah, and so I think that that's.
I think that that's one of the beautiful things about showing up on social media.
That I've found is so many people Not everyone can relate to being kidnapped by a serial killer.
Thank God.
Not everyone can relate to that, right?
Everyone can relate to having something terrible happen and having to figure out how do I navigate this.
What does my life look like going forward?
Do I continue to let the decisions of this person control me for the rest of my life?
Or do I say you know, this really crappy thing happened, but not everything happens for a reason.
I can't stand that, but maybe it's for a reason.
Maybe I can see how this made me into the person that I am today.
And I think that that's that's like humanity, that's the commonality across humanity is that we all have to figure out this thing called life.
Yeah absolutely, absolutely.
One event doesn't define you, but how you navigate life after that.
Is that it like what you said, it's just life.
It's just yeah, and and you, you can, sharing your story, i think, is going to help literally and it already has helped millions of people and it will help millions more, which is, i know, like that's an incomprehensible number, but truly like that's what it does and that's such a crazy thing to think about.
But and yeah, they can take little bits and pieces from from the story and and i think that what your point of just it being like yeah, it happened.
And now I am a mother of three beautiful children.
I'm a wife.
I'm an advocate.
I'm this and this and this.
And I'm also a survivor of something that, so it's just, it's beautiful and it's wonderful.
And thank you so much for sharing everything.
Yeah, of course.
Absolutely.
Just waiting for social media to catch up to like this idea that maybe we can be multifaceted humans that have different things that we do and are interested in and want to talk about.
Force it, force it on it.
I literally just made a video where um, you know, I'll make a video I.
My last video that I went viral for was about low contrast makeup, right?
Yes, like totally random, right.
But then every video after that, everyone's showing up and they're like is it true?
You got kidnapped by a serial killer.
And I'm like, yeah, literally just made a video.
And I was like, Hey guys, I'm going to tell you about my curly hair routine.
But first, yes, it's true.
I got kidnapped by a serial killer.
Yeah.
Start every single video that way.
Let's go to this workout routine.
But yes, I get kidnapped by a serial killer.
Here's where you can find more information.
Yes.
I think the more we are showing up authentically as humans online and showing those different facets.
People are going to catch up.
They're going to, they're going to get it because I've watched people change.
Even if we're talking about, like one of my big things that I talk about a ton is ethics and true crime.
And I have watched since the inception of Tik TOK, which it was 2020, when everyone was kind of 2019 2020, when everyone was started.
Is that when you started to 2020?
Yeah.
2020, beginning of 2020.
That was like peak political chaos.
I'm showing up and sharing a story about how good law enforcement was for me at the peak of ACAB.
Yeah.
And having very difficult conversations with people.
And I'm talking about ethics and true crime when no one else is talking about it.
Right.
And now people are conscious consumers of true crime and they they're like they want to to consume things that are done ethically.
And so um, it's proof that if we just keep talking about these things, if we just kind of like beat the dead horse, eventually everyone will catch on.
Um, because I mean, I've seen it happen.
It's just, It takes time.
It's hard to be a like a change maker.
It's hard to do that.
And especially with a young audience, like once you like, you have like our age kind of, and then there you have like the 14 15, 16 year olds.
It's it'll take a while.
I'm trying to figure out like what that looks like.
I'm like, I was given that audience for a reason and I need to figure out what that looks like.
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
It's hard.
What year is that?
I'm 38.
It's been a really long time since I was a teenager now.
Totally.
The world's different.
It really is.
It is.
But yeah.
Awesome.
Well, thank you.
Thank you.
I'll talk to you later.
Yeah.
Have a good rest of your day.
See you.
Bye.
Okay, everybody.
I hope you enjoyed that interview.
It was so incredibly eye-opening to hear the accounts from the person themselves that actually went through it and to hear her perspective and how she's going through life now.
I think it just paints this picture that not a lot of us get to see, and I think it's really important with a lot of things that we talked about.
And I'd also like you to know that all the proceeds from this video are going to a charity of Kara's Choice.
She's done so much work in advocating for survivors and giving back, and I would just like to do something to help.
But I think there's a lot to take away from this interview in terms of just life in general.
And just thinking about how you treat people, especially trauma survivors, and just to take into account that anything that anybody's ever been through just you know, being able to put yourself in their shoes or being able to take trauma that you've experienced and being able to get past that
I think Kara is a wonderful example of that.
And she's inspired me.
A lot.
So make sure to go check out all of her stuff, show her support in her comment sections and I will see you a beautiful face in the next video.
Okay.
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