A texas teen Kidnapped from an NBA game, sex trafficked and held against her will in a hotel 200 miles away, her horrific week of abuse has been revealed before investigators discovered her photo in an online sex ad next to her captors. Had tolerated.
Natalie Cramer, now 18, was only 15 when she and her father attended a Mavericks game at the American Airlines Center. in dallas 8 April 2022.
Cramer, who is now sober and pursuing a GED, said she relied on marijuana and alcohol to deal with her anxiety at the time, and when the game started, she started feeling anxious, she told WFAA.
“I was feeling good and ready to hang out with (my dad),” Cramer told the outlet. “We got there, sat down in our seats. …The first trimester happened, and I started getting this anxious feeling. This craving to get high or do drugs.”
Texas girl caught at hotel after Dallas Mavericks game by men with ‘AK-47 style’ rifles: lawsuit
The Oklahoma City Police Department arrested Saniya Alexander, Melissa Wheeler, Chevon Gibson, Kenneth Nelson, Sarah Hayes, Karen Gonzales, Thalia Gibson and Steven Hill in connection with the trafficking of 15-year-old Natalie Cramer from a Dallas Mavericks game. (Oklahoma City Detention Center)
Cramer told her father that she was going to the bathroom, but left her phone on her seat and did not return.
At the arena gathering, Cramer made eye contact with his alleged kidnapper, 33-year-old Emmanuel Cartagena.
“I was just walking around and I saw this guy,” Cramer recalled. “I told him, ‘I really want to smoke. Do you smoke?’
Cramer said she walked back with Cartagena to her car, where she said she had marijuana to smoke. A second man met them in a parking garage, and the three drove to a home in North Texas.
15-year-old Texas girl trafficked to Mavericks game in Dallas; 8 arrested in Oklahoma: Police
“He didn’t tell me there was anyone else there with him,” Cramer said. “It was just him. He told me we would walk back to his car that was parked in the parking lot… in the garage… and then another guy came over. He told me the marijuana was still in the car.
“They gave me marijuana,” she told WFAA. “But he had more things in mind.”
Cramer was held in a home against her will for several days before being sold to a sex trafficking ring in oklahoma,
Meanwhile, her father, Kyle Morris, reported his daughter missing from the field when she did not return to her seat. But he was told he had to report him as a runaway to his home police department, 30 miles away. Cramer had left his parents’ home several times before and had previously been reported as a runaway.
A negative review for ESA – Oklahoma City Airport Hotel describes prostitution occurring inside the establishment. (Dallas County lawsuit)
Desperate for answers, the family hired a private investigator in Houston who specializes in these types of cases. Within minutes, he was able to find photos of Cramer posted in an online sex ad and locate her in Oklahoma City.
Kenneth Levan Nelson, one of eight suspects arrested by Oklahoma City authorities in Cramer’s kidnapping, allegedly posted nude photos online.
According to a lawsuit filed by the hotel, Nelson, a convicted sex offender, “rented at least two hotel rooms” at the Extended Stay America Oklahoma City Airport Hotel and at least two other hotel rooms under a false name. Was connected with. Cramer’s parents.
According to the lawsuit, Cramer was in possession of “numerous drugs, including alcohol and methamphetamine.” She remembered seeing a family at the hotel while she was drunk walking through the hall, some people next to her carrying assault rifles.
Texas girl trafficked from Dallas Mavericks game was listed as ‘runaway’ before nude photos surfaced
Oklahoma City authorities arrested and charged eight people after allegedly trafficking 15-year-old Natalie Cramer from the Dallas Mavericks game at the American Airlines Center on April 8, 2022. (Getty Images)
Cramer said, “I was even more surprised to see a family there with young children, and they looked me in the eyes and saw that all these people were older than me and still weren’t saying anything.” “The father of these little children looked at me, and he couldn’t tell anything in the hotel. (The man who trafficked him) had a full rifle, and the family carried on like nothing happened.”
On 18th April a police officer Saw a teenage girl walking outside an apartment complex and asked if she was Natalie Cramer. She told the officer that she had been raped and that she had been rescued.
He described his defense as an answered prayer.
“I was just praying to God,” she said. “‘I’m tired. I can’t do this anymore. I need someone. Please send someone.'”
The officer took an unidentified photo of him in the back of his cruiser.
“I had braces at the time and one of the guys punched me in the mouth,” Cramer told CBS News about the photo. “My entire cheek was bruised. My braces were on the inside of my cheek.”
A view of the American Airlines Center before the Dallas Mavericks and Minnesota Timberwolves practice for a game in Dallas on December 17, 2020. (Jerome Miron/Imagen Images)
Cramer said she spoke to the officer before the eight people – Saniya Alexander, Melissa Wheeler, Chevon Gibson, Kenneth Nelson, Sarah Hayes, Karen Gonzales, Thalia Gibson and Steven Hill – were arrested, minutes after she was arrested. Was done.
According to WFAA, Cartagena, the man who allegedly drove Cramer back to her car before being trafficked, was arrested by U.S. Marshals in January 2023 and charged with sexual assault of a child. But a Dallas County grand jury decided there was not enough evidence to prosecute him.
“I know there were things I could have done to prevent it, but I don’t know that all of the choices that were made were not my choices,” Cramer told WFAA. “A part of me felt guilty, but I had to come to terms with the fact that this is my life, and they ruined my life. I can’t feel sorry for them because they didn’t feel sorry for me.”
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Cramer said she didn’t realize anything was wrong until it happened. being raped And that his kidnapping was not the typical “guy with candy in the back of the van”.
“It seems like a normal conversation until it happens. You don’t realize you’re in danger until you’re in the middle of it. And you don’t know what to do, and you can’t get out. ” Cramer said. “There’s no room for judging people because they can’t go out. If they could go, they would.”
She added, “I didn’t know how to leave because I was scared.” “I could have called for the phone, but they would have been right there. What was I supposed to do? Even if I ran, where would I go? I didn’t know where I was.”
Cramer’s family has since started a organization called aisling Helping survivors of sexual assault and human trafficking.
