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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Step into the 2020 True Crime Vault where you'll hear our most gripping stories.
I didn't know what to think. I'm just screaming.
Tonight on 2020, a breakthrough in the story that transfixed the nation, the disappearance of baby Sabrina.
A five-month-old girl who disappeared from her home in the middle of the night.
This is where he heard the baby crying.
Grieving parents who some thought didn't quite look the part. Perception was that they were cold.
Seen by some as being unemotional.
Before long, police are zeroing in on them. They said, we believe you know where your daughter is.
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Chapter 2: What happened to baby Sabrina Eisenberg?
How much do you think about her? We think about her every day. Sabrina has a room in our home. So this is Sabrina's room. This is the room that, you know, when Sabrina comes home, this is her room. Are these really her baby clothes? These are her baby clothes.
And I've said from the very beginning, and I still say it, when she comes home, we're going to donate them together.
We changed the room a few years ago from taking out all the Beanie Babies and toys because she's 20 years old now. She is 20 years old now, is 20 years old. So you feel confident that she's still alive?
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Because who would take a baby to hurt them?
Do you play that back in your mind, going in to her crib, finding her missing, running to the neighbor, calling 911? How much do you remember all of that? I don't play it back. It hurts too much. It's painful. It was November 23, 1997, a Sunday night, the family watching a movie.
Later, Marlene and Steve tuck their three kids, 8-year-old William, 4-year-old Monica, and baby Sabrina into bed for the night. The next morning, Marlene recalls waking up and getting her son out of bed first.
And as I turn around and I look and notice my laundry room door out to my garage is opened. And then as I get closer, I'm looking now out to the street and seeing that my garage door is up. So now I'm just looking straight out to the street. And I ran into the first bedroom, which is Sabrina's room. And I look in the crib and Sabrina's gone. And I scream, scream.
her new baby and her favorite yellow blanket both gone without a trace. 911.
Hello? I need to leave. My baby's been kidnapped. All right, ma'am, you need to calm down.
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Chapter 3: How did the Eisenbergs react to the police investigation?
The Eisenbergs say they'd accidentally left their garage door up all night. Was there any sign that someone had been in your house?
Other than the door being opened. Other than the door being opened, her and her blanket missing.
The laundry door, was it closed when you went to bed? Yes. Was it locked? No.
It wasn't locked. It's something that we never locked because during the day when the children are playing, that's where they go in and out with their bikes and basketball out front.
But we're not talking about the middle of the day. We're talking the middle of the night.
We felt that we were living in an area that was safer. We were on a cul-de-sac. There's one way in and one way out. We had a sense of security, a false sense of security.
Their four bedroom home nestled in the suburban sprawl of Valrico, Florida, a middle class neighborhood outside Tampa, where each house resembles the other. Some know Valrica for the flooding brought by last year's Hurricane Irma and the deluge of media that descended after baby Sabrina vanished. It's heart wrenching. It really is.
I mean, just for them to have to go through what they're going through. The community was stunned. How could a baby go missing in the night without anyone hearing a thing? Even the Eisenberg's family dog, Brownie, didn't make a sound. But how can you explain how someone could get in here and you don't hear them and you don't find any sign that they've been in here?
Well, how do people get robbed all the time and they're sleeping and somebody goes in and steals a TV or their china? This is the same thing, except they took our baby instead of china or a TV.
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Chapter 4: What role did DNA testing play in the case?
Graham Brink, an editor at the Tampa Bay Times, has covered the story for years. The idea that someone could have walked into a suburban home in the middle of the night, plucked a five-month-old child out of her crib, obviously raised a lot of suspicion around the Eisenbergs.
It's unusual for a true kidnapping. A lot of times they find out that it's someone the family knew or had knowledge of, and that's part of the leads we're looking at.
This video from that morning showing a distraught Marlene, led from her home by lead detectives Linda Burton and William Blake, while investigators begin sweeping it for clues. They dust the garage for prints, confiscate the family cars, and bring the Eisenbergs to the police station for questioning.
They interviewed us separately, doing a polygraph for Marlene and then one for me.
Did you have any concerns, any objections to doing a polygraph test?
No. We even at that time offered to give them blood and fingerprints.
Anything they needed.
Anything they needed.
Hours later, the couple says police coached them in this televised plea.
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Chapter 5: What were the public's suspicions about the Eisenbergs?
At that time, I said, are you charging us with anything? Did we do anything? He said no to those questions. And then I said, then I'd like to see, talk to an attorney.
That didn't sit well with the public or the police. And they don't hire just any lawyer. They take on famed Florida attorney Barry Cohen.
They're doing a half-assed job of trying to find Sabrina.
I first spoke to Cohen back in 1998. These are parents of a kidnapped child. Why do they need a lawyer?
They were being accused of a crime that they didn't commit.
And anybody that's accused of a crime that they didn't commit sure needs a lawyer pretty badly.
Today, Cohen is waging a more personal battle, fighting cancer.
We're at the cul-de-sac where the Eisenbergs live.
So we caught up with his old team who helped defend the Eisenbergs, lawyers Todd Foster and Steve Romine, and private investigator Kevin Calwery. Did you all make a conscious decision to cut them off from police and cooperation?
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Chapter 6: How did the media influence perceptions of the case?
Did you start to believe that they were being framed? Yes. Plus, the first glimmer of hope that baby Sabrina is alive. A gorgeous little baby pops up from Illinois, baby Paloma. Next. This show is sponsored by Bombas. It's finally spring, and if you're like a lot of people, you may be ready to get moving again with more outdoor activities that just let you enjoy spring weather.
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District Court, where prosecutors are about to reveal those secret tapes, which they say prove Marlene and Steve Eisenberg know what happened to their five-month-old baby, Sabrina. Their smoking gun. The only problem? There is no smoke. You know, when you look at that indictment and you read all the damning quotes, even one should have sealed their fate until you actually hear the audio.
I remember sitting in the gallery of the courtroom with other reporters, and when they were played, looking at each other and wondering, I can't hear anything. Can you hear anything? It sounded like chickens squawking in a hurricane. At first, even the Eisenberg's own attorneys can't believe what they're hearing.
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Chapter 7: What new evidence emerged in Sabrina's case over the years?
A judge recommends those tapes be thrown out and blast the lead detectives for their investigation, saying they acted at times with a reckless disregard for the truth. The charges quickly dropped. Those wiretaps were a total self-destruction. inflicted wound the state performed on its own case. It really obscured the rest of the investigation.
It overshadowed the question as to whether Steve and Marlene Eisenberg had anything to do with their daughter's disappearance.
Oh, she's getting up. Here she goes. I would say, you know, all the truth is going to come out. And then finally, it did. You know, the judge threw everything out, all the tapes.
Everything was lies. And the government paid a lot of money. To your legal team. To our legal team.
It's another extraordinary twist
Outraged, their legal team goes after the government for millions of dollars for a prosecution undertaken in bad faith.
For the first time in our government's history since or before that the government conceded that a federal prosecution was done vexatiously and in bad faith.
It was empowering because they said we did things that we never have done.
But there was still some suspicion. If you believe what the Eisenberg said happened, you have to believe that someone walked into the house in the middle of the night, picked the baby up out of a crib, and no one ever saw her ever again. That's difficult for a lot of people to believe. But Marlene and Steve Eisenberg once again brush aside suspicion and try to regain a normal life.
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