A US woman who was groomed and abducted by her teacher seven years ago has broken her silence on the horrific ordeal.
Elizabeth Thomas was just 15 years old when she first came into contact health science teacher Tad Cummins. The 50-year-old, who was married, showed a special interest in Ms Thomas almost immediately.
“He’d just be staring at me all during class. He was always eyeballing me, looking at me, sitting at our table,” the now-22-year-old told ABC’s 20/20 in a new interview, ahead of the release of Lifetime movie, Abducted by My Teacher: The Elizabeth Thomas Story.
“There was one time where he told me that I’d ‘look nice naked’. I realised this is getting too far.”
In January 2017, Cummins was spotted kissing Thomas on the lips on school grounds. Both denied it happened – but when another teacher noticed the amount of time they were spending together, Thomas was barred from Cummins’ class.
When the pair were then seen in his classroom the following month, he was suspended without pay. But Cummins stayed in contact with Thomas, forcing her to call and text him at regular intervals. And on March 13, 2017, he coerced her into “running away” with him.
“I didn’t want anyone to know. I was scared of what would really happen if they knew. I didn’t want to make him mad or make him come after me,” Thomas recalled.
“He said if he couldn’t have me, he would [die by suicide]. Any time he threatened himself, he threatened my family, too. He threatened to shoot himself or use the guns (on them).”
Cummins held Thomas captive for 38 days, eluding police in a cross-country expedition with the plan of starting over with bogus identities in Mexico.
Three days after she was reported missing by her parents, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI) issued a troubling statement regarding her disappearance.
“Though the TBI cannot discuss specifics at this time, investigative efforts have revealed a troubling pattern of behaviour by Tad Cummins, suggesting the 50-year-old may have been abusing his role as a teacher to groom this vulnerable young girl for some time in an effort to lure and potentially sexually exploit her,” the statement read.
“The individuals could, frankly, be anywhere.”
Over the next month, investigators tracked their movements through Mississippi, Oklahoma and Colorado, where they assumed the names John and Joanne Castro, aged 40 and 24 respectively, according to FBI special agent Utley Noble’s testimony during Cummins’ trial.
They continued through Utah and Nevada, before crossing into California where, running out of money, they met Griffin Barry – who ultimately tipped law enforcement off about their whereabouts, leading to Cummins’ arrest.
Thomas described the day police found her and her captor as “the best of my life”.
“He said not to tell [police] that we had done anything. He said to tell them I had went willingly, and that he was trying to protect me,” she said.
Cummins was federally charged with transporting a minor across state lines for the purpose of engaging in criminal sexual conduct and obstruction of justice. In April 2018, he pleaded guilty to both charges, and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
“When I started school, you picked me out of the crowd,” Thomas wrote in her victim impact statement, which she read during Cummins’ sentencing.
“I was just a kid who wanted to make friends, but you were someone who had a plan. You saw a broken girl, who was lonely, scared and traumatised.
“You made her feel safe and loved because you saw what she needed and made her believe you would be her ‘protector’. I was at a point in my life where I needed to be protected the most. And when it came down to it, that was all a part of your plan. All you were was a man who wanted sex, and you manipulated me and used me just for that.”
Despite the fact she was Cummins’ victim, Thomas was subjected to ridicule and blame from her community, who accused her of being a “willing participant” in her own kidnapping.
Now, however, she’s “tired of hiding”.
“The fear of the community bashing me, they’ve done it for so long, and I’ve just kind of hid in my own little corner,” she told E! in a separate interview, when asked about her decision to reopen her life as part of a Lifetime show.
“I’m tired of letting those people get to me, and I want other people to see that I’m not scared of them.”
– with Fox News