When Jaycee Lee Dugard resurfaced in August, she denied being the 11-year-old girl kidnapped in 1991 and defended Phillip Garrido as a "great person."
She became defensive as officers questioned her, then asked for a lawyer. She tried to convince police she was fleeing an abusive husband in Minnesota.
And then the young woman who had tried to pass herself off as "Alyssa" told police the truth, ending the 18-year mystery of her disappearance.
The account of how police discovered on Aug. 26 that Dugard was alive is contained in a state inspector general's report released Wednesday.
Although the focus of the report is on how California parole agents supervising Garrido missed chances to discover Dugard, it contains details of the final days of her captivity.
Inspector General David Shaw's report said Dugard's discovery began when Garrido, a convicted sex offender, showed up on the UC Berkeley campus with two girls who called him "Daddy."
Wary campus officials called his parole agent, and the following night the agent and a partner went to Garrido's Antioch-area home. They found his wife, Nancy, and his mother, but there was no sign of the two girls.
The agents took Garrido to their office for questioning, and along the way he told them the girls were daughters of a relative.
In Garrido's file was a notation that he should not be in the presence of minors, but that was a new restriction from July 2009, and the agents decided it didn't apply to Garrido because he had no prior convictions with minors.
They sent him home and told him to return the next day, the report found.
Garrido showed up with his wife and three younger women, and as the agent began questioning them, Nancy Garrido and "Alyssa" became "defensive and agitated."
"Alyssa said she was aware that Garrido … was a sex offender who was on parole for kidnapping and raping a woman," the report said. "She added that Garrido was a changed man and a great person who was good with her kids."
Garrido, who was being questioned separately, admitted he was the father of the two young girls and that he had kidnapped and raped "Alyssa," the report said.
Finally, "Alyssa" confirmed she was Jaycee Dugard.
Call The Bee's Sam Stanton, (916) 321-1091.
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