My Attacker Cross-Examined Me: Alisa Mathewson Part 2

0:01Elizabeth Smart Today's story includes discussion of sensitive topics including kidnapping, sexual assault, and graphic descriptions of violence. Listener discretion is advised. Previously on The Survivor Files.

0:17Alisa Mathewson I remember taking like my last bit of air from under that pillow and just thinking, I'm going to meet Jesus. I thought I was dead.

0:29Elizabeth Smart Elisa Mathewson's estranged husband has broken into her home in the early morning hours. He drags her from her bed, beats her, restrains her, rapes her, and suffocates her. By the end of the night, Elisa is just praying she lives to see the morning.

0:49Alisa Mathewson My hands were still tied behind my back, and he slit my wrist.

0:56Elizabeth Smart Leading up to the trials, Trevor attempts to control the process in any way he can, but he saves his biggest move for just before it's time for Elisa to take the stand.

1:09Alisa Mathewson His lawyer stands up. He says, I've just been informed that I have been fired, and he wishes to represent himself.

1:17Trevor Summers So you're calling it rape? It is.

1:20Alisa Mathewson That is the definition of rape, to come into someone's. Home and attack them and tie them up. You raped me.

1:29Elizabeth Smart My name is Elizabeth Smart. When I was 14 years old, I was kidnapped from my home and held captive for nine months. I survived. Now I'm on a journey to uncover how other people survived the moments that should have destroyed. Them in their own words. Today, on The Survivor Files, the finale of Elisa Mathewson's story takes us back to the moments after her failed escape attempt at Walgreens.

2:00Alisa Mathewson Trevor came running out of the Walgreens, grabbed me, threw me in the car, and took off.

2:06Elizabeth Smart The Walgreens employee is already on the phone with 911, describing a woman stumbling in the parking lot, her hands tied, screaming that she's going to be killed. He reads off the license plate as the car pulls away.

2:21Alisa Mathewson So when the police had run my license plate number, they saw six-month history of of me requesting help and no one believing me.

2:33Elizabeth Smart Did Trevor know that the employee had called 911 yet?

2:36Alisa Mathewson He did not. And I think there's a lot of people that would have seen this scene unfold and been like, that was crazy and done nothing. But the Walgreens employees, that's what triggered the search for me. Nobody had been. Alerted that anything had happened to me till that point. For six months.

2:57Elizabeth Smart Elisa has filed protective orders, made calls for help, and reported domestic violence that has never been taken seriously. Now, after her attempt to escape, Trevor is enraged that she has defied him.

3:14Alisa Mathewson He was furious. He was furious that you told me you were going to do anything. You told me you were going with me. Why would you lie to me? Why would you do something like that? He was driving so crazy, driving down back roads. He finally got far, far. Out into the country. And there was like a cattle farm, one of those cattle fences. And he pulled up to there and I watched him throw myself out. So he comes back to the car and he says, who is Cheryl? And I knew, I knew as soon as he said, who is Cheryl?

3:55Alisa Mathewson I knew the Walgreens employee had called 911 because Cheryl was a friend of mine that lived directly across the street from Trevor. And I knew if Cheryl was calling or. Messaging me, something was happening at his house.

4:17Elizabeth Smart Police now know Elisa is in serious danger. And while Trevor doesn't yet know 911 has been called, he knows the situation has escalated. So he gets Elisa out of sight and drives deeper into the Florida night.

4:35Alisa Mathewson He drove down this dark, dark country road. It was pitch black. He pulled over by this stream and it was a wooded area. He pulled me out of the car. I thought, they're never going to find my body. They're not going to be able to find me in this heavy wooded dark area. My hands were still tied behind my back and he slit my wrist. And he said, that's for getting out of the car at the Walgreens.

5:11Alisa Mathewson I can't see how bad it is. And I used the back of my shirt and put pressure, but I thought I was going to bleed out that night. Yeah, I think I would think the same thing.

5:24Elizabeth Smart Elisa survives the night, but the escape attempt at Walgreens has taught her something. If she tries again and fails, Trevor may kill her.

5:36Alisa Mathewson I didn't see any options for me to try to escape. So we stayed there for two nights. He continued to rape me.

5:45Elizabeth Smart Elisa can hear farm equipment in the distance. Other people are somewhere nearby. But Trevor never lets her close enough to be seen. And then he started listening to the radio. And he was changing radio stations and he was trying to see if anyone was looking for me. Did that spark any hope in you?

6:07Alisa Mathewson Not really. I was more worried that he would hear something and then realize they were looking for us and just basically kill me and ditch me there.

6:20Elizabeth Smart The radio doesn't carry anything about her. No bulletins, no search update, nothing that suggests they've been found. But Trevor doesn't wait for anything to change. He decides they need to move.

6:34Alisa Mathewson He made the decision that we were going to leave that spot and he was going to take us to a marina. He said that there were safe houses that are one block on water with boats behind them that you can get out into the Gulf, you can get into the intercoastal. And so he told me that that's what was going to happen.

6:58Elizabeth Smart Was that believable to you?

7:00Alisa Mathewson To me, yes.

7:00Elizabeth Smart He had....

7:05Alisa Mathewson Convince people that he had millions in offshore accounts. And so I was just like, I was scared because people with money and people who are in a situation where they're desperate, they have means to figure these things out.

7:21Elizabeth Smart Trevor starts the car up. Elisa has no idea whether the next stop is an escape route or the place he intends to kill her.

7:31Alisa Mathewson He then drives across to a gas station. He has me go climb all the way back to the third row. He went inside and got a newspaper and he came back to the car and then he went like a little pull-off parking area.

7:47Elizabeth Smart There at the entrance to Anna Maria Island and up ahead, a police officer is parked on the side of the road. Trevor doesn't risk driving past, so instead he pulls over and waits.

8:00Alisa Mathewson So he sat there and And he's going through the newspaper and there was this little tiny, tiny blurb. About me on page four. And he said, nobody's looking for you.

8:12Elizabeth Smart While they wait for it to become safe to drive again, Trevor passes the time by writing letters.

8:19Alisa Mathewson He wrote things like leaving me his house, his car, his bank accounts. Like he was writing all of these things, leaving me custody of the children, leaving.

8:32Elizabeth Smart But even then, Trevor is deceiving her because he doesn't intend to let her live. He allows her to read those letters, but the one he writes to the children he keeps private.

8:45Alisa Mathewson The letter between him and the children, that was the murder-suicide letter.

8:58Elizabeth Smart So he planned on killing himself as well.

9:01Alisa Mathewson Correct. He wrote in that letter to the kids that they are good children, that we love them, but we have ended it all for their sake. That we should have never gone down the road of divorce and that they have good people in their life that will raise them to, you know, make sure that they have a good life.

9:27Elizabeth Smart Trevor finally deems it safe to leave and starts heading back toward Tampa. Then, for the first time, the search for Elisa breaks through the silence.

9:38Alisa Mathewson That's when we heard it on the radio. Heard about my kidnapping. My lawyer was talking on the radio about how I was petrified of him.

9:49Elizabeth Smart The police are already searching. Now, the public has Elisa's name and Trevor's story that they left together to work on their marriage. Is beginning to fall apart.

10:02Alisa Mathewson He went down to Apollo Beach and there's a marina there and some restaurants and things like that. He pulled up behind one of the restaurants by the dumpster. He had put me into the second row captain's chair right behind the driver's seat and he had tied rope around my arm and run it through the seat and then onto the other arm he then goes into the back row and that's when the rope came around my head it hit my hand because my hands were here He.

10:43Elizabeth Smart Had tied Elisa to the seat in such a way that her arms were bent against her chest with her hands near her face. So when he brings the rope around her neck, it doesn't land cleanly on her throat. It catches her hands, taking just enough pressure off of her neck.

11:02Alisa Mathewson He was strangling me. And all of a sudden, he stopped, suddenly stopped strangling me and like dove into. The driver's seat and took off. I mean like gravel flying, wheels spinning, screeching out of there. And I remember just gasping from this whole ordeal and looking back and trying to turn my head and I see a black pickup truck.

11:33Elizabeth Smart The driver of the black pickup truck has seen enough and calls 911. But Elisa doesn't know that. All she knows is that Trevor has stopped strangling her and is now driving as fast as he can.

11:49Alisa Mathewson Trevor drove down this road and there are these houses that are like up on stilts and the cars pull underneath of them. So he pulls underneath of one of them. And he said, you see, see that car? Back there, that's an undercover police officer. It's an undercover police officer. I did not believe him.

12:11Alisa Mathewson I didn't believe him.

12:13Elizabeth Smart Trevor believes the police have found them, and now the murder-suicide plan he described in his letter to the children is unfolding.

12:21Alisa Mathewson He starts slitting his throat, saying, this is what love is. I'm laying my life down for you. You don't deserve this. And the skin is separating and the blood is. Just coming out. And I'm screaming. And the next thing I know is full-on tactical, gun-shrown, swarm around the vehicle. And they're all on his side.

12:58Alisa Mathewson On the passenger side of the vehicle, and they're screaming, let us see your hands, let us see your hands.

13:04Elizabeth Smart Police have found them. Elisa is still tied up inside the car, and Trevor is bleeding beside her.

13:11Alisa Mathewson My door swung open, and Officer Nick reached in, grabbed me, and carried me out and put me into his squad car. It wasn't until. Nick and I had come up to the police barricade, that that's when I just 100% lost it. Like, I cannot believe that I'm alive right now.

13:40Elizabeth Smart After 55 hours, Elisa's captivity is over. But she's not settled. Elisa doesn't know what has happened to her children. She doesn't even know whether Trevor is still alive.

13:53Alisa Mathewson I was like, is he alive? Is he dead? Where is he? What's going on? Had no idea. But I asked him, do my parents know? And he's like, everybody knows, Elisa. Everybody knows. Your parents are at command center. He's like, it's a nationwide manhunt for you. And I said, okay, are my kids safe? Where are my kids? And he said, as soon as we get there, we know your kids are with detectives. Detectives, we've had police with your kids around the clock. Your kids are safe.

14:26Alisa Mathewson And I said, okay.

14:30Elizabeth Smart But before she can see her children, before she can see her parents, police need her to tell them everything.

14:38Alisa Mathewson So then they interrogated me for about two hours. Please ask me, can you help us to collect evidence? And I said, absolutely. I want to help you get as much evidence as you need. So they take me into this other room before we went to go collect evidence. And I didn't really, at that point, understand what collecting evidence really entailed.

15:00Elizabeth Smart Uh-huh.

15:01Alisa Mathewson You know.

15:02Elizabeth Smart I do know.

15:03Alisa Mathewson You do know. There's nothing. that prepares any person for that.

15:12Elizabeth Smart A female detective takes her to a crisis center where a forensic nurse documents the evidence on and inside her body.

15:21Alisa Mathewson At this point, it was like 8 o'clock at night, and they took evidence from my body. Under my fingernails, every part of my body was examined and photographed. And it's just something. And I had already given birth to five children. I couldn't imagine going through something like that. That was very traumatic to the point that I couldn't drive down the road that that crisis center was on for several years because of that.

16:00Elizabeth Smart The exam continues late into the night. Elisa hasn't slept. She hasn't been home, and she still hasn't seen her children. Then Elisa is told if she wants to get her children back, she must appear in court the next day.

16:17Alisa Mathewson Found out the next morning. That while I was missing, they didn't think I was going to be found. So they took custody of my children. The state of Florida took custody of my children.

16:32Elizabeth Smart Okay.

16:33Alisa Mathewson And because my parents were not residents of the state of Florida, but Trevor's parents were residents of the state of Florida, they had given custody to his parents. Whoa. Oh, my goodness.

16:50Elizabeth Smart Okay. My mind's a little bit blown. We're a lot bit blown right now. I can't imagine that they just handed custody back over to you.

17:02Alisa Mathewson They did not give me because I said, okay, but I'm alive. I'm here. Give me my children. And they said, no, it doesn't work that way.

17:14Elizabeth Smart The state said that?

17:16Alisa Mathewson Yes, that is correct.

17:17Elizabeth Smart Oh my gosh. Okay. So tell me what happened next. Okay.

17:23Alisa Mathewson So I was hit with a gag order, which has been lifted.

17:28Elizabeth Smart Oh my gosh.

17:28Trevor Summers Oh my gosh.

17:30Alisa Mathewson On top of everything, you've been hit with a gag order.

17:34Elizabeth Smart Let me help you heal. Shut up. Yes.

17:38Alisa Mathewson So, at first they were with Trevor's parents for a month. I had to have the court-ordered psych evaluations done. And I could see my. Children for one hour a week at a monitored visitation center.

17:55Elizabeth Smart Whoa. Okay. You have just survived that. Something so horrific and so hellish and then to be treated like a criminal.

18:08Alisa Mathewson So my lawyer said, if you're taking her children, what are you charging my client with? For the first month, they didn't know what they were charging me with. They just wanted me to. Get psyche vows done. So my lawyer again argued, you cannot take children into Even if she does have PTSD, you have to charge her with something. So they did. They charged me with inadequately supervising my children on the dates of my kidnapping.

18:43Elizabeth Smart Oh, you are kidding me.

18:45Alisa Mathewson Yep. You cannot make this stuff up.

18:48Elizabeth Smart Like, this is insane. Elisa completes the psychological evaluations. She attends court-ordered parenting classes. continues to go to therapy, and creates a stable home. But her children don't all return at once.

19:06Alisa Mathewson So the youngest three were returned to me about six months later. And as soon as they came home, I got them right into therapy.

19:17Elizabeth Smart Arden is next. The 14-year-old has already begun to understand how her father manipulated her in his violent scheme.

19:27Alisa Mathewson We had the termination of parental right hearing for Trevor, where the state terminated his parental right. And that is when Arden was immediately given back to me. Landon, they moved him to another family's house, and they told me that I was never going to be able to bring him home safely. That he was 13 now.

19:54Alisa Mathewson He was angry. He blamed me for most of this.

19:58Elizabeth Smart I mean, as a mother, thinking about hearing someone tell me that it wouldn't be safe for my child to come move home with me, I think that would break my heart. I mean, I think that would just like rip my heart right out of my chest and destroy it. That must have been. Absolutely excruciating for you to hear. During the time after Elisa separates from Trevor, she begins a new relationship with Jeffrey Mathewson. He becomes a steady presence for her and for the children. When Elisa and Jeff decide to marry, Landon agrees to meet with him.

20:42Alisa Mathewson Jeff met Landon, and we were married a week later, and Landon was there at our wedding. And I think it was two weeks, three weeks after we were married, they said it was safe for Landon to transition home because Jeff was there. Living in the home.

21:00Elizabeth Smart Trevor is charged with kidnapping, attempted murder, sexual battery, and a series of other crimes. The case takes six years to go to trial. But Elisa goes to every hearing and status conference, preparing for the day she would speak against him in court. I mean, how did you prepare?

21:20Alisa Mathewson Seeing him at all of these things prepared me for the trial. It allowed me to kind of just. Be numb to him. And that was something I worked through with therapy. I did a lot of exposure therapy. Going back, reliving it, talking about it, going to that field down that dirt road under the tree where I was held for two nights, going back to the Walgreens, going back to the house, driving the car. I went back to living in the same house because the car didn't hurt me. The house didn't hurt me. that was, you know, gave me some strength to say, I can do this. I can sleep in the same bed that I was raped in, which some people think, but it was like, I rearranged my room.

22:15Alisa Mathewson I changed things up.

22:17Elizabeth Smart I mean, I understand.

22:18Alisa Mathewson I do.

22:20Elizabeth Smart Like the night I, yeah, the night I was rescued, I went back and slept in the same bed that I was kidnapped out of. So I get it. Before the trial begins. Lawyers question dozens of potential jurors trying to build a panel that can hear the case fairly. The process is called voir dire. It's where both sides try to understand who the jurors are and whether they can be impartial in a case like this.

22:51Alisa Mathewson They read the 11 charges on him. Does anyone have reason why they could not sit on this jury? I watched as a. Sea of hands went up of women. I said, what is happening? And they said, statistically, Elisa, we knew this was going to happen. When all of.

23:17Elizabeth Smart Those hands go up, it's clear that allegations have hit a nerve. The raised hands mean these women have either experienced this kind of violence themselves or know someone who has.

23:30Alisa Mathewson They exhausted the jury pool and were left at the end of it with like 10 women out of 60. Then each side gets eight strikes. So as they pulled juror numbers out, every time it was a woman, the defense struck the woman and we ended up with an all-male jury.

23:58Elizabeth Smart Oh, wow. Oh, wow. Leading up to the trial, Trevor attempts to control the process in any way he can.

24:07Alisa Mathewson He went through seven attorneys. And then it was, is he confident to stand trial?

24:15Elizabeth Smart But he saves his biggest move for just before it's time for Elisa to take the stand.

24:21Alisa Mathewson We just excused the jury. We're taking a break before cross-examination. And his lawyer stands up, and I knew it. I knew it as soon as the man stood up. He says, I've just been informed that I have been fired, and he wishes to represent himself.

24:43Judge Mr. Summers, cross-examination.

24:45Trevor Summers Okay. Good morning, Ms. Matheson. I wanted to review the testimony that you gave here today.

24:53Elizabeth Smart Yes, that's Trevor's voice. Now that he's representing himself, he can question Elisa directly. The decision puts him back in control again, or so he believes. He stands in front of the woman he kidnapped, restrained, raped, and tried to kill, and begins asking her questions.

25:16Trevor Summers In your statement here in this courtroom, you said that you knew I was going to kill you when you saw my face. Correct yes how did you know what was in my heart how did you know what was in my mind.

25:34Alisa Mathewson All i saw was an expression of evil and hatred and at that time my thought is i'm he's here to kill me i'm gonna.

25:45Trevor Summers Die but you can't say that that's what my.

25:48Alisa Mathewson Intention was no i cannot okay um is there anything that would say that was my intention. He placed the pillow over my face with such force until I lost consciousness. That is why, reasons to believe that you were there to kill me because I came that close to death.

26:14Elizabeth Smart Trevor uses a familiar tactic, challenging Elisa's version of her own experience, arguing that no matter what he did, She can't claim to know what he intended. Then he tries to reinforce his version of events, the same story he told his children, that he went there simply to talk about their marriage. Now he's trying to sell that same story to the jury.

26:44Trevor Summers What did we talk about for five hours?

26:48Alisa Mathewson I didn't do much talking. You can go on and on and on. About random nonsense and it is, it's incoherent nonsense, but you can just go on about it.

27:03Trevor Summers Do you remember specifically what incoherent nonsense I was talking about?

27:09Alisa Mathewson Chartering a boat, money in offshore accounts, having, going to the island, having a bodyguard to watch.

27:18Trevor Summers Me, our children.

27:22Alisa Mathewson What happened through the marriage? There's many, many, many topics that you could go on.

27:26Trevor Summers For hours about.

27:28Elizabeth Smart Then he begins talking about their sex life during marriage.

27:33Trevor Summers Did we, during our marriage, use peripheral objects in our sexual activity?

27:43Alisa Mathewson More in the early marriage, prior to having five children.

27:49Trevor Summers Did we get more adventurous in our sexual habits.

27:54Attorney Judge, I'm going to object.

27:56Elizabeth Smart Trevor tries to blur the line between consent and captivity, using their sexual history to suggest that what Elisa describes as restraint was somehow intimate.

28:08Trevor Summers Let me ask you, Mrs. Matheson, do we ever use scarves intimately?

28:16Alisa Mathewson I don't recall a single instance. I don't recall any. I was unsteady at first. And then it's like you are, you know, talking about you raping me. You're talking about suffocating me. You're talking about all of these things. And you're trying to make it out like I consented to all of this. Like I got tied up as some sort of kinky thing. And.

28:48Alisa Mathewson He kept talking about us having sex and us doing this and how many times did we have sex during our marriage and did we do this way and that way and all of this.

29:00Trevor Summers Is it true that we had sex?

29:04Elizabeth Smart Trevor keeps trying to equate the intimacy they had during their marriage with his assault on her that night.

29:11Trevor Summers After the divorce.

29:14Alisa Mathewson Several hours of being hogtied, you've untied me and had sex with me a second time.

29:21Elizabeth Smart For years, Trevor has told police, the courts, their children, that Elisa is lying. Now he has given her the chance to answer him directly.

29:33Trevor Summers Did I threaten you to have sex?

29:39Alisa Mathewson You broke into my home in the middle of the night when I was sleeping, attacked me and tied me up. I take that as, yes, you threatened me to have sex with you. Yes.

29:50Trevor Summers I'm asking you specifically, before we had sex, did I threaten you or force you to have sex with me?

29:58Alisa Mathewson My answer is yes, you forced me to have sex with you.

30:02Trevor Summers Did I hold you down?

30:05Alisa Mathewson No.

30:05Trevor Summers Did I push you?

30:08Alisa Mathewson Not at that time of having sex, but prior to having sex, you did push me, you did hold me down, you did tie me up, you did attack me, and you did break into my home when I was sleeping. You raped me.

30:22Trevor Summers So you're calling it rape? It is rape.

30:25Alisa Mathewson That is the definition of rape, to come into someone's home and attack them and tie them up and then have sex with them. That is the definition of rape.

30:42Elizabeth Smart It's a bizarrely surreal display. Trevor acknowledging horrific details with an almost casual detachment, as if they're just facts to be explained away.

30:55Trevor Summers Um, did, uh, I ask you to drive me to the hospital after my neck was cut?

31:02Elizabeth Smart No.

31:02Trevor Summers Okay. Then the deputies have to cut you out of that scene.

31:06Alisa Mathewson They did not.

31:07Elizabeth Smart I just wanted to note the time that the cross-examination's been taking place.

31:12Trevor Summers It's been four hours. Yep, I'm just about finished. We're at the end of the timeline.

31:18Elizabeth Smart After deliberations begin, the jury needs less than five hours to bring back a verdict of guilty... on all charges.

31:27Alisa Mathewson He had 11 charges. The first three was kidnapping, which carries a life sentence. Attempted murder in Florida carries a life sentence. Attempted murder again, so suffocating me and strangling me. Slitting my wrist did not count as attempted murder, but that was an assault. He had grand theft for using my car. And then he had violating a protective order. He had charges against the children as well, like a child endangerment charges.

32:08Elizabeth Smart In total, the judgment amounts to three life sentences plus 224 years.

32:17Alisa Mathewson Judge could have hit him with three life sentences and basically excused the rest. The problem with doing that is you then make it that what my children experienced and what they went through mean nothing. Their charges were tacked on at the end. So in order for the judge to say, I see you, I hear your pain, and that deserves you also getting closure and a strong sentence for the part that he put you through.

32:52Elizabeth Smart Sounds like we need more judges like him. The sentence ends Trevor's ability to hurt Elisa again, but it doesn't erase what happened. For Elisa and her children, healing is not a single moment. It's the life they continue building together along with her new husband, Jeffrey. What does your life look like today?

33:14Alisa Mathewson I am blessed beyond measure. We travel in an RV. We spend our summers here and we spend our winters in Florida. So we chase the weather. The youngest three still travel with us. They homeschool and we do a lot of national parks. We joined a homeschool traveling group and we just got back from prom. The kids had their prom and so it was nice.

33:45Elizabeth Smart Oh, that's amazing. I'm so happy for you. Looking back now, What do you. Wish people understood about situations like yours?

33:58Alisa Mathewson I think. That people think that traumatic things happen to you and you can't go on to live an abundant, full life afterwards. Like, you're just doomed. And I thought there was times where I thought I was just going to roll in a ball and be like, this is my life now. I'm just. Going to sign up for, you know, government assistance.

34:24Alisa Mathewson You know, I probably do have PTSD. I don't know how I'm going to be able to function. All of those things went through my mind. But I had five kids depending on me. And I think I really did it for them. where days that I did not want to get up and keep going, nobody realized, nobody tells you how bad the aftermath is. And I was not prepared for the aftermath, but it was them that got me to get out of that and keep fighting and keep going.

35:03Elizabeth Smart If you had one thing to say to other victims who find themselves in maybe a similar situation to what you did, what would you want them to hear?

35:17Alisa Mathewson Trust your instincts. Trust yourself. You know, nobody else is going to know that person more than you. You can have police and judges and lawyers and churches telling you. Different things. You can even have domestic violence organizations telling you. But you have to make the decisions for yourself. And you have to trust your instincts.

35:49Alisa Mathewson And just know that there's others out there that have been through really horrific things and have come out on the other side more than okay. You know, I look at how my life was before everything happened to me and how just... stuck I was in an awful, terrible marriage. And if I had not had the strength to leave, even though it almost killed me, I.

36:20Alisa Mathewson Would never have what I have today. It was worth the risk. It was 100% worth the risk.

36:27Elizabeth Smart Well, you have just been absolutely incredible to talk to. I mean, thank you for. Being so vulnerable and just sharing your I know it takes so much courage to go back and, like, talk about those worst moments again. I mean, truly, thank you, thank you, thank you so much.

36:46Alisa Mathewson Thank you.

36:47Elizabeth Smart Next time on The Survivor Files. You heard their remarkable stories of survival. You sent us the questions that you couldn't stop thinking about. Now, they're answering those questions. Lisa May, Eduardo Valseca. and Elisa Mathewson, three extraordinary survivors. Join me to answer the questions that stayed with you. Thank you for listening to The Survivor Files.

37:18Elizabeth Smart New episodes every Monday. Subscribe, listen, share, and follow us at The Survivor Files Pod on Instagram. The Survivor Files is produced by Marwar Junction Productions for iHeart Podcasts. Our producers are Steve Kniff and Natalie Freed. Our executive producers are Joseph Freed and Allison Berkley. The executive producer for iHeart Podcasts is Katrina Norvell.