This is Deborah Roberts. You're about to hear the first episode of our newest podcast series from 2020 and ABC Audio, banished. What Happened to Vanessa? It investigates the mysterious disappearance of Vanessa Gien, a soldier who was stationed at Fort Hood in Texas. The search for Vanessa and the shocking details that were discovered would

eventually lead to a reckoning in the military. We'll be releasing the series right here

on the 2020 feed over the next few weeks. Or if you can't wait, you can get new episodes early

by following Vanished What Happened to Vanessa on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music,

or wherever you listen to podcast. Now, here's episode one.

April 22nd, 2020, just before 6 a.m., U.S. Army soldier Vanessa Guillen is in her barracks at Fort Hood.

It's a huge military base in the middle of Texas. She gets a call on her cell phone, answers,

and is marked present for duty in that morning's roll call. Vanessa is 20 years old.

She's a private first class.

Her life as a soldier is highly regimented.

Every day, there are multiple check-ins to account for her whereabouts.

It's the early weeks of COVID,

but Vanessa is still working in person as a small arms mechanic.

She's been given a work assignment and doesn't expect it to take long.

Higher ups have been more lax about uniforms because of the pandemic.

So today she wears civilian clothes, a black t-shirt, purple leggings, and nikes.

At around 8 a.m., she texts a friend, a fellow soldier.

They're supposed to meet up for a hike that afternoon.

Then, just after 9 a.m., she texts her boyfriend back in Houston, Juan Cruz. They'd recently gotten engaged.

The last message she told me I have to work in a few minutes,

and that was the last message she'd sent me.

At 10.03 in the morning, Vanessa arrives at work.

...