Kriti Mehrotra
It was May 20, 2013, when the entire community of Dayton, Iowa, was left shaken to the very core as two young girls were abducted by a convicted predator a mere block away from their homes. However, as chronicled in HBO Max’s ‘Taken Together: Who Killed Lyric and Elizabeth?’ while profiling registered sex offender Michael Klunder, it was a lot more harrowing for Dezi Hughes. That is because she is one of the girls who had been kidnapped alongside her best friend, just to be the only one to escape through sheer will as well as a lot of luck a short while later.
Dezi Hughes Was Merely 12 When She Was Kidnapped
As per Dezi’s own accounts, everything seemed perfectly normal on that fateful Monday when she and 15-year-old Kathlynn Shepard were walking home after their school bus had dropped them off. Though little did they know a red truck would soon pull up beside them, with the driver asking if they were willing to help him mow his lawn in exchange for money on that hot afternoon. Since this was a small town area and the girls were nearly at their destinations, they told him they would do so but first needed to ask their parents, just for him to insist he drive them.
“So, we got in the truck,” Dezi somberly conceded in the aforementioned original. “He told us, you know, his name was Michael, and he offered to shake our hands. He was a pretty big guy.” Therefore, when he immediately started driving in the opposite direction, they knew they couldn’t do anything except urge him to take them back because they really did need to ask for permission. That’s when he told them they could use his phone once they reached his property, only to then take back gravel roads until they reached a rural, secluded agricultural facility in Pilot Mound.
“It seemed more and more unsettling the father we got,” Dezi stated. “When we got there, there were two hog confinements, and there was a shed in front of the lawn. He pointed, and he’s like, ‘Oh, there’s the lawnmowers.’ We walked in there, we were kinda looking around…, [and when] we went to turn around, he had a gun pointed at us.” They admittedly grew so afraid at this point they followed his ensuing commands until their hands were zip-tied while lying on their stomachs, following which he remarked he would let them go if they continued obeying his every order.
Dezi Hughes Fled While Michael Klunder Was Distracted With Her Best Friend
According to Dezi’s statements, she was a bit confused by Michael’s actions because while he apologized upon mistakenly stepping on her thighs, he subsequently also pulled out a knife at them. Nevertheless, this confusion soon changed into pure terror as he grabbed Kathlynn by the arm before ripping her from the ground in anger. After hearing her state, Dezi was extremely scared. The then-12-year-old still vividly remembers her best friend screaming her name as soon as he’d finished pulling her to the corner before suddenly going quiet, driving her to somehow move.
“I moved my arms underneath me, unfolded them so they were in front, and I grabbed his gun,” Dezi admitted. “I ran as fast as I could. When I got into the woods, I hid behind a tree.” She then checked if the tranquilizing gun in her hand was loaded, but it was not, so she decided to go deeper into the lumbers in order to avoid him as he got into his truck and sped away. Fortunately, with mere scrapes as well as splinters across her body, she soon managed to find safety on a nearby farm, whose owner let her call the police before even sending one of his friends to the scene.
But alas, by that time, Michael had managed to escape with Kathlynn, only for him to be found hanging to death in another agricultural facility owned by a relative at 8 pm — he’d died by suicide. His truck was right there and splattered with blood, yet it wasn’t until 18 days later, on June 7, 2013, that volunteers sadly found the 15-year-old’s cold remains in the Des Moines River near Ogden. As per reports, she had been stabbed 27 times, and her throat had been slashed, yet her cause of death was severe blunt force trauma to the head — Michael had killed her before killing himself.
Dezi Hughes Still Struggles With Survivor’s Guilt and Prefers to Stay Away From the Limelight
Dezi was hospitalized when the search for Kathlynn commenced, and the n she wasn’t allowed to go out looking for her as her loved ones believed she needed to recuperate as much as possible. Hence, when the teen’s body was recovered, she shut herself in her room and felt immense regret, thinking she did not do anything to help her best friend either on that fateful May afternoon or later. But alas, neither the Shepards nor anyone else blames her for anything that transpired — instead, per the docuseries, they think of her as a hero because she had the courage to escape and is inadvertently the reason Michael Klunder is not terrorizing other young girls anymore.
“I felt like they’d hate me because I hated myself,” said Dezi, prior to referring to her actions on May 20, 2013, when she was just another Southeast Valley Junior High School student. “I couldn’t do anything. And even if I could have done anything, I didn’t try. It’s the one thing I regret most because I feel like I still should have tried.” Thus, it goes without saying that the trauma of the abduction and losing her best friend still hangs over her head like a dark cloud, but it seems like she is trying to move on in life while still being based in Iowa. Though Dezi, now 23, might not be able to have Kathleen’s favorite drink, Pepsi, anymore and is likely struggling with several other personal demons, she is keeping the former’s memories alive in her heart.
Read More: Kathlynn Shepard Murder: What Happened to Michael Klunder?
