Vanished: A New Life

Speaker 1 is Deborah Roberts here with another weekly episode of our latest series from 2020 and ABC Audio, Vanished: What Happened to Vanessa?

Speaker 1 Remember, you can get new episodes early if you follow Vanished: What happened to Vanessa on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or your favorite podcast app. Now, here's the episode

Speaker 2 on an overcast day in April 2021, Vanessa's family returns to Fort Hood.

Speaker 2 They used to hold weekly protests at this base, demanding that the Army find their missing daughter, their missing sister. But this time, there's no Vanessa to find.

Speaker 2 It's been nearly a year since Vanessa's murder. Cecily Aguilar is in jail, but she hasn't been sentenced yet.

Speaker 2 Today, Vanessa's family is back at Fort Hood as invited guests to unveil a memorial for her. A group of soldiers stand at attention, holding flags that flap in the wind.

Speaker 3 At this time, we would like to pay special recognition to all general officers, sergeants, major, distinguished guests.

Speaker 2 This isn't the first time the Army has formerly honored Vanessa. After her remains were found, she was promoted to the rank of specialist.

Speaker 2 Vanessa's sisters, Myra and Lupe, sit on metal folding chairs next to their father Rogelio, Juan, Vanessa's fiancée, and other family.

Speaker 2 Lieutenant General Pat White acknowledges how it's a hard day, but he says it's also an important one.

Speaker 4 I want current and future soldiers to understand the impact of what we're doing here today.

Speaker 2 Now there will be a permanent memorial to Vanessa, one that has her name and picture on it.

Speaker 4 And you can come learn just a little bit about Vanessa, but mostly it's so in two, three, four years,

Speaker 4 we haven't forgotten what this is all about, what this moment is about in our history. If her legacy is going to live on through this monument here, that you'll help us unveil.

Speaker 2 The ceremony feels heavy and solemn. When Vanessa's younger sister, Lupe, gets up to speak, she says she's had mixed feelings about the gate.

Speaker 5 They should have cared when she was alive.

Speaker 5 Not until now.

Speaker 2 Why put up a memorial to Vanessa in this place where she was so brutally murdered? But Lupe

Speaker 2 also sees some good in it.

Speaker 5 The positive side of this gate. is to remember her name

Speaker 5 into her mind and reflect about what happened April 22nd.

Speaker 5 About those victims, both men and women, being victims of sexual violence, to not stay in silence, to not be afraid to report it,

Speaker 5 and to simply speak up because my sister couldn't speak up.

Speaker 2 A gate and a memorial plaque. It's a way for the army to honor Vanessa.
But for Lupe, it's not enough. It's not the same as having her sister back, alive.

Speaker 2 It's not accountability. So she puts out a call to action.

Speaker 5 We have to pass legislation in order for this to stop because it had to take my sister's life for us to realize the bigger issues. Sexual violence is not an issue.

Speaker 5 It's an epidemic inside the armed forces

Speaker 5 and she had to die. She had to be murdered and dismembered and burned.

Speaker 5 In order for us, all of us here, to realize that this is happening for decades.

Speaker 5 My sister deserved her protection and respect.

Speaker 5 And we are here now, her name being in the gate in her picture, but not her.

Speaker 5 So the people who are watching today

Speaker 5 or watch this later on,

Speaker 5 help us pass the Ayn Vanessa Kien Act

Speaker 2 in her honor.

Speaker 2 While the Army and law enforcement investigated Vanessa's death, Vanessa's family took their fight for justice all the way to Washington, D.C.

Speaker 2 They even got an audience with President Donald Trump, who promised Vanessa's death would be investigated.

Speaker 6 As you know, the FBI and the DOJ are now involved, so we're going to get to the bottom of it. And how could it have happened when nobody knew about it?

Speaker 2 Vanessa's story started out as the case of a missing soldier, and it might have stayed that way, but her family fought for her, taking on the U.S.

Speaker 2 Army when they thought it wasn't doing enough to find her. They got local, national, even international media to cover Vanessa's story.
And once her body was finally found, her family didn't stop.

Speaker 2 They kept fighting. Eventually, they'd force a reckoning inside the Army, the Pentagon, and even the halls of Congress.

Speaker 2 As the family tried to heal, they wanted to make sure that what happened to Vanessa wouldn't happen to any other soldier. So they set out to change the U.S.
military.

Speaker 2 And five years later, after all that fighting, where do things stand today?

Speaker 2 And where does that leave Vanessa's family?

Speaker 2 From ABC Audio in 2020, this is Vanish.

Speaker 2 What happened to Vanessa? I'm I'm John Quinones.

Speaker 2 This is episode 6, A New Life.

Speaker 2 About a week after the GATE ceremony, the Guillens got some information they'd been waiting on for months.

Speaker 9 While the Army releasing a highly anticipated report regarding the death of Vanessa Guillen today, ABC 13.

Speaker 2 The Army announced the results of their internal investigation into how leaders at Fort Hood responded to Vanessa's disappearance and murder. It also examined the sexual harassment issues.

Speaker 2 It was a thick report with large chunks of black redacted text.

Speaker 2 This was not the independent review commissioned by the Army we mentioned before. That independent review was external and it was led by a committee of civilians, including a retired FBI investigator.

Speaker 2 This new new report was internal and was headed by a four-star general. It was the Army's way of looking in the mirror and assessing itself.

Speaker 2 The major findings of this new investigation?

Speaker 2 Vanessa, initially being labeled AWOL or absent without leave, was a problem because that classification didn't reflect her true status. Missing.

Speaker 2 The report said that the Army lacked a better way to categorize her. The internal report said overall, the Army had done a good job looking for Vanessa.

Speaker 2 Their search was, quote, immediate and well-coordinated. But it also said some things could have been improved, like better use of the media and social media.

Speaker 2 By not engaging the media sooner, the Army acknowledged Fort Hood had lost the trust of the Guillen family and the surrounding community.

Speaker 2 For Vanessa's sister Myra, the Army's characterization of the search did not match what she observed.

Speaker 12 That specific point where they claimed that the search was immediate and

Speaker 12 coordinated. I'm like, I was there, I know what happened and didn't happen.

Speaker 2 The Army's assessment that the initial search went well also doesn't align with the conclusions of the Independent Review Committee.

Speaker 2 That committee said that Fort Hood's Criminal Investigation Division lacked experience with serious and complex cases like Vanessa's and had a number of missteps early on that took them off course.

Speaker 2 And remember, in the last episode, when Aaron Robinson, the main suspect in Vanessa's murder, got away? He was being held in a conference room and escaped.

Speaker 2 The Army's internal review blamed poor communication for allowing that to happen.

Speaker 2 And one final finding was especially important for Vanessa's family. What the Army concluded about Vanessa's sexual harassment.

Speaker 13 Tonight, the Army's long-awaited report into specialist Vanessa Guillen's disappearance and murder finding that she had indeed been sexually harassed by a superior, as her family has insisted from the start.

Speaker 13 The Army admitting they failed.

Speaker 2 This acknowledgement from the Army that Vanessa had been sexually harassed, it was a big reversal from what the Army had said in the early months of their investigation, that there was no evidence Vanessa had been sexually assaulted or harassed.

Speaker 2 Listen to Army investigator Damon Phelps speaking at a press conference in July 2020. This was just a few days after Vanessa's remains were found.

Speaker 14 There has been no information, and we've we've interviewed hundreds of people to include all acquaintances and co-workers of Miss Gian.

Speaker 14 So there's no allegation whatsoever that she's been sexually assaulted or harassed. And any hint of information that

Speaker 14 was sexual harassment was completely looked at without any credible information.

Speaker 2 But nearly a year later, the Army reached a far different conclusion. It found evidence that Vanessa had actually been sexually harassed on two different occasions.

Speaker 2 So was there a connection between the sexual harassment and her death?

Speaker 2 The Army said Vanessa's harasser was not specialist Aaron Robinson, the man who killed her.

Speaker 2 The Army said it found no credible evidence that Robinson had sexually harassed Vanessa or had any relationship with her outside of work.

Speaker 2 But the Army did find that Aaron Robinson had sexually harassed another soldier in person over text and through potential stalking. The soldier he was harassing felt threatened and unsafe.

Speaker 2 When Vanessa's older sister Myra read the report, she was skeptical.

Speaker 2 Robinson had harassed someone, and just because there wasn't evidence that he'd harassed Vanessa, that did not clear him in her mind.

Speaker 12 So it gets very confusing when they want to state that Robinson wasn't doing the harassment because we don't actually know that. You have no evidence whether if he actually did it in person.

Speaker 12 The only two people that you could possibly ask if this harassment was being done, they're both no longer here.

Speaker 2 And if there wasn't any harassment, why would Robinson kill Vanessa? It left the family still searching for his motive.

Speaker 2 I went to see one of the top Army leaders who helped oversee this internal investigation.

Speaker 2 In June 2021, I met with Major General Gene LaBeouf in North Carolina near Fort Bragg, one of the largest Army bases in the country. Major General, how are you? Good morning.

Speaker 16 Admiral pleasure to meet you today too.

Speaker 2 Thank you. Have to see you.
Thank you. Thank you.
Once we settle in, I ask the question Myra and her family have been wondering.

Speaker 2 How can you be so certain that she was never harassed by him?

Speaker 16 Well, this is an extremely detailed investigation.

Speaker 16 They interviewed over 150 different people as part of this investigation, and they reviewed 6,000 emails, over 11,500 pages of documents over a three-month period.

Speaker 16 Nowhere in our investigation was there any evidence that Specialist Robinson had sexually harassed Specialist Guillain?

Speaker 2 But there was no one in that, no other witnesses in that arms room where she was killed. There were no cameras there.

Speaker 2 How do you know that she wasn't sexually harassed right then and there before she was killed by Robinson?

Speaker 16 Yeah, John,

Speaker 16 we don't know that.

Speaker 16 You're correct. There are no cameras there.
Specialist Robinson and Specialist Guillain were alone while Specialist Guillain was conducting an inventory in that arms room.

Speaker 16 So we don't know that for certain.

Speaker 2 So according to the Army, who was harassing Vanessa?

Speaker 2 The Army found evidence that Vanessa was sexually harassed by a supervisor. This validated what Vanessa had confided to her mother and what her family had been saying all along.

Speaker 2 ABC News reached out to Fort Hood, and they confirmed that the supervisor who harassed Vanessa was in her chain of command.

Speaker 2 Steve Campion is a former journalist who covered Vanessa's story for the ABC News own station in Houston, KTRK.

Speaker 8 The report details two incidents where Vanessa Guillain experienced sexual harassment.

Speaker 8 First, there's a supervisor who makes vulgar remarks to her in Spanish about wanting to have a threesome, about wanting to participate in group sex.

Speaker 8 The second incident involves Vanessa trying to take a bath out in the field, and she feels as if a supervisor is trying to watch her.

Speaker 2 The Army determined that the person who harassed Vanessa had created an intimidating and hostile work environment, but it never identified Vanessa's harasser publicly.

Speaker 2 Back in North Carolina, I asked Major General Gene LaBeouf why the Army didn't disclose this information.

Speaker 2 You understand why the family wants to know who this man was who was sexually harassing their daughter.

Speaker 16 Yes, John, and we fully respect that. And I've had the honor of speaking with the family on prior occasions, provide them updates.

Speaker 2 You can't release his name.

Speaker 16 We can't release his name for the matter of privacy.

Speaker 16 These are administrative actions. And because they're administrative actions, they're also referred to as personnel actions in the United States Army.
And so unfortunately,

Speaker 16 based on Army policy, we can't reveal the names of these individuals because it's a personnel matter and it would invade their privacy that they have due process for.

Speaker 2 As for how Fort Hood investigators had handled the search for Vanessa, I asked Major General LaBeouf about that too.

Speaker 2 You have to admit that early on in the investigation, there were too many mistakes, too many blunders.

Speaker 16 The investigation revealed that there were errors that occurred, errors in accountability, errors with respect to leadership.

Speaker 16 All these things unfortunately transpired at a point at which we had one of our own

Speaker 16 go missing.

Speaker 2 Was this a botched investigation by the U.S. Army?

Speaker 16 No, we don't believe so, because we were able to find probable cause to link Specialist Robinson to the disappearance and death of Specialist Guillain.

Speaker 2 Despite early errors in the search, Major General LaBeouf told me the Army stands by the overall investigation. And he said Vanessa's death, quote, tugs at our heart.

Speaker 16 We'll never forget Vanessa Guen, John. We'll never forget her.

Speaker 16 There's a gate named after Vanessa Guillen at Fort Hood, Texas, that the members of the 3rd Cavalry Regiment, Vanessa's unit, enters and exits every day, the same gate that Vanessa entered and exit.

Speaker 16 Fort Hood, Texas, will never forget Vanessa Guin.

Speaker 2 When I sat down with Major General LaBeouf in the summer of 2021, he said Vanessa's death had prompted some significant changes.

Speaker 16 In my 36-year career, I have not seen the level of changes happening in our Army as we're seeing it today. And that's a very good thing for the United States Army.

Speaker 2 One big change? The Army's Criminal Investigation Division, or CID, is now headed by a civilian, giving it more independence over its investigations. And there was more.

Speaker 2 21 soldiers, including some senior leaders in Vanessa's brigade, were reprimanded or disciplined. A handful of senior officers were fired.

Speaker 18 There was definitely a fallout.

Speaker 2 Louis Martinez is ABC's senior Pentagon reporter. He's been covering the military for more than 20 years.

Speaker 18 It's just not typical to see a senior officer. We're talking about a two-star general who is removed from command.

Speaker 2 The fact that Vanessa, a junior enlisted soldier, became the spark that exploded into a leadership shake-up like this one, that was pretty exceptional.

Speaker 2 The Army decided to make some other changes too, like establishing a new missing persons protocol.

Speaker 2 As we've said, before Vanessa, a soldier who didn't show up for duty was assumed to be AWOL or absent without leave.

Speaker 2 That label came with a negative connotation because it meant that the person didn't get permission to not show up for work.

Speaker 2 It also wouldn't trigger alarm bells for the Army to jumpstart a search.

Speaker 2 Now there's a new classification, absent unknown.

Speaker 18 The Army now says anybody who fails to show up for their job is considered missing, and they're going to be put into this new category. It's called absent unknown.

Speaker 18 And they're going to do their best to figure out where you are.

Speaker 2 But for Vanessa's family, restructuring CID, the firing or disciplining of senior leaders, or even the fact that the Army changed how they classified missing soldiers, those things didn't add up to justice or accountability.

Speaker 2 The changes Vanessa's family wanted to see demanded a much bigger fight.

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Speaker 17 Good morning, everyone.

Speaker 17 Thank you for coming today.

Speaker 17 We're here to demand justice for Vanessa.

Speaker 2 In July 2020, a month after Vanessa's remains were found, the Guillen's lawyer, Natalie Kawam, stands in front of a long blue banner at the U.S. Capitol.

Speaker 2 In one corner, there's a photo of Vanessa in uniform with an American flag behind her. Large white letters on the banner spell out the hashtag, I am Vanessa Guillen.

Speaker 2 Kawam addresses a crowd of people holding up posters with Vanessa's face.

Speaker 17 We want to introduce the hashtag I am Vanessa Gee and Bill.

Speaker 17 This will save lives.

Speaker 17 Our military deserves better.

Speaker 17 They deserve to be protected.

Speaker 17 They fight for us, right, every day?

Speaker 17 We're here to fight for them.

Speaker 17 Protect the protectors.

Speaker 2 The story of Vanessa's sexual harassment has snowballed into into a me-too reckoning in the military.

Speaker 2 Her family and supporters are using that momentum to seek an act of Congress, legislation that would fundamentally change how the military deals with sexual harassment and sexual assault.

Speaker 2 Vanessa's sister Lupe is a powerful voice in fighting for this legislation.

Speaker 2 My sister deserves to be remembered and to be honored by a bell!

Speaker 2 While Lupe's raw emotion captures people's attention, in speeches like this one, you can hear how much she's suffering. I haven't slept in three months.

Speaker 2 I haven't slept. I haven't eaten.

Speaker 2 I'm stressed. And that sadness just comes to me when I see Vanessa's picture, which is almost every minute that I see Vanessa and social media.

Speaker 2 This isn't a new fight in Congress.

Speaker 2 Then-California Representative Jackie Speer, a Democrat, had been pushing for nearly a decade to change how the military deals with sexual assault and harassment cases. She wasn't getting anywhere.

Speaker 24 I wouldn't even get Democratic support for it.

Speaker 2 But Representative Speer says Vanessa's case became a turning point.

Speaker 24 There is no justice for Vanessa.

Speaker 24 Vanessa was brutally brutally murdered. Her family is in great pain.

Speaker 24 But I'm hoping that we can fashion this legislation and get it passed to protect other women and men who become victims of sexual assault or sexual harassment.

Speaker 2 So Representative Speer, who at the time served on the House Armed Services Committee, gets to work on co-authoring a new bill.

Speaker 2 In the Senate, she finds a partner in Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand.

Speaker 5 We're fighting to make sure what happened to Vanessa Guillen never happens again.

Speaker 2 The legislation they're spearheading.

Speaker 2 It sets out to remove some key decisions from the military's chain of command when it comes to investigating and also prosecuting sexual harassment and assault allegations.

Speaker 2 Instead, those decisions would be made by independent military prosecutors and not commanders.

Speaker 2 Remember, the Army found that Vanessa had been sexually harassed by a supervisor, a fellow soldier in her chain of command.

Speaker 2 Vanessa confided in her mother that she was afraid to report the harassment, that she feared retaliation.

Speaker 2 Again, Representative Jackie Speer.

Speaker 24 As long as you have to report these cases up your chain of command, there is not going to be the willingness to come forward.

Speaker 24 Most service members today, they want to make a career out of military service. So if you're falling in that category, you don't want to rock the boat.

Speaker 24 And so the system is created so you don't rock the boat.

Speaker 2 For more than a year, Vanessa's family traveled to Washington, D.C. to build momentum for Congress to pass this new legislation.

Speaker 24 We've come a long way in just a year, and we have the Guillen family in particular to thank.

Speaker 24 Now, we've got to make sure that we remember Vanessa Guillain

Speaker 2 forever.

Speaker 24 We can't bring her back, but her legacy has to be that this bill is passed and signed into law.

Speaker 2 Then, after months of meeting with lawmakers, Vanessa's family and supporters score a big victory.

Speaker 2 In December 2021, the House of Representatives passes a version of the IM Vanessa Guillen bill that gets folded into a bigger piece of legislation, the National Defense Authorization Act.

Speaker 2 A couple of weeks later, the bill comes up for a vote in the U.S. Senate.

Speaker 10 Senators voting in the affirmative.

Speaker 14 Bozeman, Burr, Cardin, Cassidy, Cotton, Inhoff, Kane, King, Klovichar.

Speaker 2 It takes about an hour, and then it's over. The legislation passes by a huge margin.
The final vote, 88 to 11.

Speaker 2 That day, Vanessa's sister Myra posts on social media, writing in all caps, the bill has been passed. And then she adds, This is a bittersweet feeling.

Speaker 2 The loss of my sister created the biggest military law change in history.

Speaker 23 And this morning, President Biden signed the $770 billion National Defense Authorization Act for the 2022 year.

Speaker 23 Part of that legislation includes sweeping changes to the military and how it handles sexual assault and harassment cases. This comes after Vanessa Guillain was murdered last year at Fort Hood.

Speaker 2 Now, prosecution decisions for sexual harassment and sexual assault cases would be made by independent investigators instead of commanders.

Speaker 2 It also created new protections against retaliation for victims. This legislation that Vanessa's family fought so hard for paved the way for other changes, too.
A big one?

Speaker 2 Sexual harassment is now classified as a crime under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Remarkably, it hadn't been a crime before.

Speaker 2 That change even required an executive order from President Biden.

Speaker 18 Vanessa Guillain's murder became more than just a criminal story.

Speaker 2 I asked ABC senior Pentagon reporter Louis Martinez about the significance of these changes and of Vanessa's case.

Speaker 18 It really turned into a whole national discussion about how the Army and the Pentagon treated cases of missing service members, how they treated service members who were alleging sexual harassment.

Speaker 18 That led to Congress getting involved. And ultimately, a couple of years later, we saw some really big changes in how the military handles sexual harassment and sexual assault cases.

Speaker 18 It really put in place some major reforms that victims' right advocates have been calling on for decades.

Speaker 2 Vanessa Guillain's disappearance and murder became a catalyst for military reform.

Speaker 2 More than five years after her death, and with reforms in place now for a couple of years, have those changes actually made a difference? Could they be measured in some quantifiable way?

Speaker 2 ABC News reached out to Fort Hood with a long list of questions, including questions about the latest rates of sexual harassment and assault. We asked Louie to walk us through their answers.

Speaker 18 Well, they they gave us some numbers. Now, they only go through fiscal year 24, so that's essentially the last year.

Speaker 2 The Army told ABC News that between 2023 and 2024, Fort Hood saw a nearly 50% drop in reported sexual harassment cases.

Speaker 18 When we asked them how many Fort Hood service members had reported sexual assault in FY24 and 23, they said that there was a 13% decrease in those years.

Speaker 2 The Army also pointed us to the Department of Defense's most recent sexual assault survey results from fiscal year 2024.

Speaker 2 It's an anonymous survey that happens every two years across the entire military. The results, the DOD found what they called a significant decrease in reported cases of sexual assault.

Speaker 18 It was the first drop actually that they'd seen in those reports in more than a decade.

Speaker 2 I asked Louie to help me understand what these numbers actually mean.

Speaker 2 So the Army says that Fort Hood there are fewer cases of sexual harassment and sexual assault. What do you make of that claim?

Speaker 18 The numbers that they did provide, I think, kind of give us a picture that at least they think there's some progress. But what we're seeing

Speaker 18 at Fort Hood reflects a broader picture of what has been happening in the Army. The Army as a whole had experienced a 13% drop.
And I think you could call that progress.

Speaker 18 Remember, the Army is the largest service. and so therefore they're probably the biggest reflection of what's going on within the military.

Speaker 18 But those numbers can vary year to year, so it's really hard to make a real judgment.

Speaker 2 One of the challenges is that those numbers can be interpreted in different ways.

Speaker 19 Well, you hope when you see that sexual harassment reports are going down, that that is indicative of the fact that sexual harassment itself is going down.

Speaker 2 Don Christensen is a retired Air Force colonel who once served as the Air Force's chief prosecutor. After he retired from the military, he led an advocacy organization called Protect Our Defenders.

Speaker 2 He was also part of the grassroots movement after Vanessa's death that pushed Congress to reform how sexual harassment and assault are handled in the military.

Speaker 2 He says one way to think about a drop in reported cases is that the reforms

Speaker 2 working.

Speaker 19 But it's also just a possibility people weren't willing to come forward.

Speaker 19 What I hope those numbers tell us when we see a decrease is that we're moving the right direction.

Speaker 19 We're never going to eliminate rape, sexual assault, but we're going to get as hopefully as low as we can.

Speaker 2 Christensen says the new law has only been in effect for a couple of years, too soon to get a full sense of its impact.

Speaker 2 But when ABC News spoke to him in September 2025, he worried momentum might be shifting away from these reforms.

Speaker 19 What we're really seeing is the messaging coming from the current administration.

Speaker 19 When the Secretary of Defense, very early on, sends out a message that basically makes it clear that he's on the side of those accused of these kinds of crimes versus those who are victims of these kinds of crimes.

Speaker 19 I think it was no more walking on eggshells. I think this is what he called his reform.

Speaker 2 At the end of September, Secretary Pete Hegseth stood before hundreds of senior military leaders at a Marine Corps base in Quatico, Virginia.

Speaker 25 I call it the No More Walking on Eggshells policy.

Speaker 2 On what would have been Vanessa's 26th birthday, Secretary Hegseth announced a sweeping series of changes to military policies and standards, everything from new physical fitness and grooming standards to an overhaul of how harassment and other complaints are handled.

Speaker 25 No more frivolous complaints. No more anonymous complaints.
No more repeat complaints. No more smearing reputations.
No more endless waiting. No more legal limbo.
No more sidetracking careers.

Speaker 25 No more walking on eggshells.

Speaker 2 Hexeth told the audience, harassment and discrimination are still illegal and that infractions will be enforced. But along with the speech came a series of memos.

Speaker 2 They contained directives like, the definition of harassment is overly broad and will be reviewed. Complaints can be filed confidentially, but anonymous complaints will no longer be allowed.

Speaker 2 And repeat complainants will be tracked. Those who knowingly file false complaints can be punished.

Speaker 2 While Hexeth said previously that equal opportunity programs to report discrimination and harassment are, quote, a good thing, he warned that he hears all the time about those programs being weaponized to retaliate against superiors.

Speaker 2 According to the most recent anonymous DoD sexual assault survey we mentioned, the one that happens every two years across the whole military, the military reported only 1% of sexual assault cases were determined to be false or baseless.

Speaker 2 Christensen says messaging that complaints are widely made in bad faith undercuts victims.

Speaker 19 There's a real culture of disbelief within the military when it comes to sexual assault.

Speaker 19 We see it in the civilian world, too, but there's just this idea that victims are constantly coming forward and making false allegations, and that's been reinforced by the current leadership.

Speaker 2 Christensen says survivors and advocates are concerned about the current climate. This includes alleged victims who reach out to him for legal advice.

Speaker 19 From talking to particularly women serving right now, there's a lot of angst with the current administration. They see a lot of hostility to women serving.

Speaker 19 And so I think the administration, although they can't change the legislation without going through Congress, they can send and they have sent a message to the force that we think the pendulum swung too far far to the victim side and we're going to bring it back over to the offender side.

Speaker 2 What does Vanessa's family have to say about these changes she inspired and Vanessa's legacy more than five years after her death? I check in with them to find out.

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Speaker 2 Samira, and it's been years now, and it's good to see you again.

Speaker 11 Thank you, John. Yes, it's been a long time since we last spoke.

Speaker 2 We began this podcast with Myra Guillen driving to the base to find her sister, Vanessa.

Speaker 2 The family's relentless search for answers and for justice transformed Vanessa's case into something much bigger than a murder investigation.

Speaker 2 Vanessa Guillen became and will be remembered for starting a movement. A few weeks ago, I called Myra for an update on how the family is doing today.

Speaker 2 It's been five years since you devoted yourself to protesting and trying to get legislation passed. Tell me about your life now.
What has changed?

Speaker 11 The first few years, it was just pure advocacy. Yeah.
And then it shifted a little bit towards the end of 2023.

Speaker 11 I did find out that I was pregnant. I am a mom now.
I have a one-year-old and I did.

Speaker 2 Congratulations.

Speaker 11 Thank you. I did step back a bit from advocacy and the political side of things just because it's

Speaker 11 a new beginning, you know, for myself, for my family. We have a new member now, and he's been a blessing for us and has brought so much joy and another view to life ever since Vanessa's passing.

Speaker 2 One year old and what's his name?

Speaker 11 Arturo.

Speaker 2 Arturo.

Speaker 2 Myra says she might get back to doing advocacy and she might even run for elected office someday. But right now, she's focused on raising her son, this new life.

Speaker 11 It's exhausting.

Speaker 11 It's truly been an eye-opener for me. I see things so much differently now.
I can say that when Vanessa passed, everything just seemed so unfair, so

Speaker 11 sad.

Speaker 11 It was, you know, anger, resentment, a number of emotions that we all felt. And

Speaker 11 now the baby has brought so much light, happiness,

Speaker 11 a new view to things. And,

Speaker 11 you know, we see it as a big blessing. It's something that keeps my mind busy and off things.

Speaker 2 I asked Myra about the rest of the family. Lupe is 22 years old now and is in college.
After Vanessa died, Lupe raised her voice at rallies and press conferences, demanding justice for Vanessa.

Speaker 2 Myra told me that being so public and outspoken about Vanessa's murder took a really big toll on her little sister.

Speaker 11 I know Lupe

Speaker 11 Herself, it was very hard for her to

Speaker 11 accept what happened and move on. And she did step back

Speaker 11 fully from the advocacy part because it was just too much.

Speaker 2 Myra also shared that her mother Gloria has continued to struggle with the loss of Vanessa. But her church community and faith in God have been her salvation.

Speaker 11 She was just very, very sick, and she was able to pull through that depression, that anguish, that

Speaker 11 phase she was in, and she was able to overcome that. And she's slowly getting into a better health form, and she's slowly, you know, accepting that things happen for a reason.

Speaker 11 And she's trying to make the best memory possible that can be done for Vanessa. So it's been a battle

Speaker 11 for her, but she's slowly trying to get better and to accept, you know, that it's been five years.

Speaker 2 Remember that altar in the Guillen family's living room that they had decorated with pictures and artifacts from Vanessa's life? That altar became a kind of shrine to Vanessa.

Speaker 2 Well, Myra told me the family eventually made the decision to take most of it down.

Speaker 11 It helped us heal in a way, and now we kind of just have the paintings that we value the most. And of course, her graduation photo.

Speaker 11 And just in a way, organized and surrounded by the legislations that have been passed in her honor and the congressional honors that she received.

Speaker 2 You know, Myra, it's been more than five years since Vanessa passed away. And at first, you and your family wanted the answer, right, to where is Vanessa?

Speaker 2 And then you wanted justice, and you fought for legislation to be passed. What do you want for your sister now?

Speaker 2 It's

Speaker 11 very simple, to be honest, John. It's

Speaker 11 for her memory to keep being honored and for the military to do what's right when it comes to these cases.

Speaker 11 Again, I feel like we'll never know the true motive as to why Vanessa was murdered.

Speaker 2 It's a question we're going to have for a very long time.

Speaker 11 Vanessa's death should have been more than enough to to prevent anybody else from being hurt or being

Speaker 11 harassed in any way, shape, or form. And it's still happening.

Speaker 11 It's sad to say that it's still happening. It shouldn't be happening.

Speaker 2 Myra has mostly put her advocacy on hold for now. Still, she continues to use social media to spotlight cases that have echoes of what happened to Vanessa.

Speaker 2 The recent death of a Navy sailor whose remains were found in a duffel bag in the woods of Virginia, allegedly killed by a fellow sailor.

Speaker 2 A Fort Hood sergeant who was sentenced to life in prison after being convicted of attempted murder, rape, and kidnapping for attacking five women in their barracks.

Speaker 2 For Myra, these kinds of cases show there's still a lot more work to be done to to protect victims of sexual violence in the military.

Speaker 11 I would hate to put up a fight again, but if I have to, then that's what's going to happen because it's just not.

Speaker 11 We're not just going to sit back and be like, oh, okay, this is, you know, it's going to happen again.

Speaker 11 Whatever, let's just let it be. No.

Speaker 2 What would she think about everything the family did for her in her memory and in the fight to change things?

Speaker 11 I strongly believe she would

Speaker 11 be very proud to see how far we were able to get.

Speaker 11 I never thought that I had it in me. I never saw myself dealing with such a big issue at such a young age.

Speaker 11 And I'm proud to say that we've accomplished something really big, and it's all because of her.

Speaker 2 Because of Vanessa, a beloved sister and daughter, a soldier who vanished in my home state, Atehana, whose family would not be ignored, they brought Vanessa's story all the way to the White House.

Speaker 2 They took on the military, also Congress.

Speaker 2 And they made sure Vanessa's name would never be forgotten.

Speaker 9 I am Vanessa Guillen.

Speaker 5 I am Vanessa Guillen. You'll soy Vanessa Guillen.

Speaker 9 I am Vanessa Guillen.

Speaker 22 I am Vanessa Guillen. I am Vanessa Guillen.
I am Vanessa Guillen.

Speaker 2 Vanished, What Happened to Vanessa is a production of ABC Audio and 2020, hosted by me, John Quignones, produced by Nancy Rosenbaum, Sabrina Fang, Shane McKeon, and Nora Ritchie.

Speaker 2 Fact-checking and production help from Audrey Mostek and Annalisa Linder. Our story editor is Tracy Samuelson.
Our supervising producer is Sasha Aslanian.

Speaker 2 Music and mixing by Evan Viola.

Speaker 2 Special thanks to Katie Dendos, Janice Johnston, Stephanie Ramos, Catherine Falders, Ann Flaherty, Denise Martinez-Ramundo, Natalie Cardenas, Rachel Walker, Brian Mazerski, and Michelle Margulis.

Speaker 2 Josh Cohan is our Director of Podcast Programming. Laura Mayer is our executive producer.