Introducing "The Hand in the Window"
Devil in the Desert
ABC News
4.6 • 625 Ratings
🗓️ 5 November 2025
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | As a 911 dispatcher for more than two decades, Sarah Miller has made a career out of staying |
| 0:09.4 | calm under pressure. |
| 0:11.4 | I've worked three different locations. |
| 0:14.0 | You like it? |
| 0:15.0 | Yeah. |
| 0:16.0 | I was made to be a dispatcher. |
| 0:18.0 | Sarah says she's good at multitasking, which she says is a requirement for the job. |
| 0:24.5 | We usually have six to eight screens depending on what center you're at. |
| 0:28.5 | When Sarah starts a shift, she logs into all those computers, and then she waits. |
| 0:35.7 | You never know when the call will come in or what kind of call it's going to be. |
| 0:41.7 | In September 2016, Sarah was working the overnight shift in Ashland, Ohio, a rural town |
| 0:48.9 | about 60 miles southwest of Cleveland. |
| 0:51.9 | Just before 7 a.m., the sun was rising over Ashland's cornfields, marshes, and woods. |
| 1:03.9 | Sarah was about to clock out when one more call came in. |
| 1:09.8 | Hi, 1-1-1. What is the address to your emergency? |
| 1:12.9 | At the first, I couldn't hear her. It was real quiet. She was whispering. |
| 1:18.9 | What is it? Fourth Street laundromat. |
| 1:23.0 | The Fourth Street laundromat. There were just five laundromats in Ashland. The one on 4th Street was |
| 1:29.2 | near the center of town, a few blocks from Ashland's Main Street, with its brewery, restaurants, |
| 1:36.2 | bank, and dairy queen. |
| 1:42.6 | Police identify the caller as Jane Doe to protect her privacy. |
| 1:47.7 | She said she'd been abducted and that the man holding her captive was sleeping nearby. |
... |
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