For six long years, the name Kayla Unbehaun lingered in missing-person databases, flashing across news tickers and cold case programs — a haunting reminder of a family torn apart. She had vanished from an Illinois suburb on the Fourth of July, 2017, after what was supposed to be a simple camping trip with her mother.
Her father, Ryan Iserka, had kissed his nine-year-old daughter goodbye that morning, never imagining it would be the last time he’d see her for more than half a decade.
The parade had ended, the fireworks faded, and the night closed in with silence — a silence that would stretch into years of heartbreak and unanswered questions.
Ryan’s last contact with Kayla’s mother, Heather Unbehaun, came that evening. She told him she was taking Kayla on a brief camping trip before bringing her home. But when the weekend passed and neither of them returned, his worry turned to panic. Repeated calls went unanswered. Her home was empty. Her phone was dead.
Days later, investigators confirmed what he already feared: they were gone.
A felony warrant was soon issued for Heather Unbehaun’s arrest on charges of kidnapping and child abduction. What began as a local search in South Elgin, Illinois, soon drew national attention. Flyers, alerts, and interviews followed — Ryan’s desperate face appearing on TV, pleading for his daughter’s safe return.
But weeks turned into months, months into years, and hope began to slip away. Leads dried up. Detectives moved on to newer cases. Ryan refused to stop. He kept Kayla’s room as it was — the lavender walls, her favorite stuffed fox still propped on the bed — waiting.
He marked her birthdays quietly, each year leaving a new card on her pillow, even when the world had stopped looking.
Then, in May 2023, everything changed.
In Asheville, North Carolina — 600 miles away — a local woman walked into a store and saw a teenage girl who looked strangely familiar. Something about the shape of her face, the curve of her smile, triggered a memory. That night, the woman couldn’t shake the feeling. She turned on Netflix, scrolling through true crime programs, and stopped at an episode of Unsolved Mysteries featuring parental abductions.
There it was. Kayla’s face.
The woman grabbed her phone and called the authorities.
Within 24 hours, Asheville police located the teen, who confirmed her name: Kayla Unbehaun. She was safe, alive, and visibly confused as officers gently escorted her to safety. She had been living quietly with her mother all these years, moving often, using different names.
For Ryan, the call from police came late in the evening. When the officer told him, “We’ve found her,” he didn’t speak for nearly a minute.
“Is she okay?” was all he could manage to say.
“Yes,” the officer replied. “She’s okay.”
He broke down then — six years of grief and disbelief collapsing in an instant.
Within days, father and daughter were reunited. Witnesses described their first meeting as both joyous and heartbreaking. Kayla, now fifteen, had changed — taller, older, cautious — but when she saw him, her voice cracked as she whispered, “Dad.”
For Ryan, that embrace was proof of something he’d never stopped believing: that love, no matter how long it’s tested, doesn’t fade.
Meanwhile, Heather Unbehaun’s story was unraveling.
She was arrested in Asheville on a fugitive warrant from Illinois, facing serious charges of child abduction and kidnapping. Initially, she was held on a $250,000 bond before being released after posting bail. Upon her transfer back to Illinois, she was booked into the Kane County Adult Justice Center, where she remains in custody without the option of bail pending her court proceedings.
Authorities have yet to reveal full details about her years on the run — how she managed to keep her daughter hidden, what names they used, or how they survived undetected. But law enforcement officials credit the breakthrough to both the Unsolved Mysteries broadcast and the attentiveness of one stranger who refused to ignore her instincts.
“Public awareness made this happen,” said Samantha Booth, spokesperson for the Asheville Police Department. “It’s a reminder that people really do make a difference — that someone paying attention can change everything.”
The reunion between Kayla and her father wasn’t simple. After six years of living under false pretenses, adjusting to the truth would take time. Psychologists specializing in parental abduction cases describe this as one of the most complex forms of trauma: a child torn between loyalty and reality, between love for both parents and the painful recognition of betrayal.
Ryan has handled the situation quietly, asking for privacy. In a brief statement released through the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, he expressed gratitude for everyone involved:
“For years, I prayed for this moment,” he wrote. “Kayla is home, and that’s all that matters. I’m asking for compassion and space as we rebuild our lives.”
The case has reignited national discussion about parental abduction, a crime that often hides in plain sight. According to the FBI, more than 200,000 children are taken by family members in the United States each year, most during custody disputes. Many never make it home.
Experts point out that cases like Kayla’s reveal both the dangers and the emotional toll of such abductions. “These children are not just missing,” said one investigator. “They grow up with rewritten histories — told lies to justify the disappearance. Finding them is only the first step. Healing takes much longer.”
As for Kayla, she’s back in Illinois, surrounded by relatives, friends, and counselors helping her adjust to a new normal. Neighbors who remember her as a little girl describe her return as surreal.
“She was this sweet kid who loved drawing on the sidewalk,” one neighbor recalled. “Now she’s a teenager. You can’t get those years back — but at least she’s home.”
For Ryan, home is once again filled with small sounds that had been missing — the hum of her music, the shuffle of her steps in the hallway, the laughter that had once felt gone forever.
He doesn’t talk much about the anger or the what-ifs. When asked by a reporter what kept him going through the years of uncertainty, his answer was simple.
“You don’t stop being a father just because someone disappears,” he said. “You keep hoping. You keep searching. And if you’re lucky, one day, hope answers back.”
That hope finally did — in the voice of a stranger watching Netflix late one night, who chose to make a call instead of turning the page.
For six years, Kayla’s name symbolized loss. Now, it stands for something else: the power of perseverance, the reach of awareness, and the quiet, unbreakable love of a parent who refused to give up.
Because sometimes, finding what’s lost isn’t about luck at all. It’s about never letting go of the belief that someday, the truth will find its way home.