NBC

Vallejo Police Accused of Treating ‘Hoax' Kidnapping Victims as ‘Perpetrators'

New accusations have surfaced in the bizarre 2015 kidnapping case that saw the Vallejo Police Department get slapped with a lawsuit.

Jim Wagstaffe, the attorney for Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn, has filed a motion that contains new statements from the victims and their family members about alleged mistreatment at the hands of Vallejo police.

“I think victims need to be respected and not called perpetrators,” Wagstaffe said. 

Wagstaffe believes that Vallejo police treated Huskins and Quinn like anything but victims.

He says police concluded early on that the couple was lying. In a motion filed Thursday night, Huskins’ mother said the lead detective told her to watch the movie "Gone Girl."

Jane Huskins said she was stunned upon being instructed to "watch a work of pure fiction to somehow explain the terrible things that were occurring to my daughter in real life."

And when Jane Huskins told police that her daughter had been molested as a little girl, the investigator said something even more jaw dropping: People who have been molested as children often want to "re-live" the thrill of that experience.

“The notion that a woman who is sexually assaulted when she's 12 years old somehow is not to be believed when she describes another sex assault that occurs in a violent way is outrageous,” Wagstaffe said.

The motion also dispels the claim by Vallejo investigators that Huskins lawyered up as soon as she was released. A statement from her cousin explains that he is the attorney police referred to.

"I was there because I was her cousin not because she had retained private attorneys immediately upon surfacing in Huntington Beach,” the statement read.

The motion also includes newly released emails from the kidnapper, Matthew Muller, to Quinn demanding $8,500 in ransom – emails Quinn says police brushed off.

Vallejo police “ignored key evidence that would have both corroborated my account and could have kept Denise from further harm,” Quinn wrote in the motion.

NBC Bay Area legal analyst Steven Clark deemed the latest revelations shocking, but police insist they acted according to the evidence they were provided.

Friday's motion was in opposition to the city's previously submitted motion to dismiss some claims in the lawsuit filed by Quinn and Huskins. A judge is scheduled to consider the motions at a hearing in Sacramento on Sept. 8.

Contact Us