Teen sex trafficking survivor who disappeared from Dallas Mavs game speaks out

Tonight, we have an update to a story we've been following for more than two years. You're about to hear from the teenage girl who disappeared from the American Airlines Center one minute. She was at the Dallas Mavericks game and 11 days later, authorities pulled the 16 year old from a sex trafficking ring in Oklahoma City. And for the first time tonight, we will hear her story in her own words. She just spoke with investigative reporter Morgan Young police have arrested a man in connection with a trafficking incident. This involves a teenage girl who was taken from a Dallas Mavericks game last year. She's the human behind the headlines. When I look at those pictures and all of those stories that people have made to me. I'm not the same person. Police found her more than a week later in a hotel room in Oklahoma City. It's like looking at a completely different person. Natalie Kramer is 18 now I got my own apartment and I'm getting my GED at the moment. She's also in therapy, still healing but ready to share, to educate and to set the record straight. I did not know anybody in this whole situation. On April 8th, 2022 she went to a basketball game with her dad. I was feeling good just ready to go hang out with him and I, we got there, sat down in our seats. First quarter happened and I started to just get this anxious feeling like this just craving like getting high or getting drugged. She admits she struggled with anxiety and coped with marijuana and alcohol. That day, she got up without a cell phone, told her dad she was going to the bathroom and just walked around and that's when I caught that guy's eye. And I told him I was like, I'm just really looking begin to smoke. Like, do you smoke? He was like, yeah, he told me we could walk back to his car. Um, that was in the parking lot in the garage and that's when the second guy came, we got to the car and I was just kind of put in there and taken to their house and they did, they did give me weed, but there was more that they had than mine. She's seen the stories about her story and wants you parents to know that this can happen to anyone. It's not like a guy with candy in the back of his van. You just get thrown in the van. It looks like a normal conversation until it's not, you don't know you're in danger until you're in the middle of it. And you don't know what to do and you can't get out. When did it click for you that you were in danger when I was raped by them. By three, those three men, she says she spent days in North Texas before being taken to Oklahoma where she was trafficked at a hotel by a different group of people. Meanwhile, her parents connected with a private investigator who found online sex ads with Natalie's photos and was able to trace them back to Oklahoma City where they connected with police and I was just praying to God. I was like, I'm tired. I I can't do this anymore. Like I need some like please send someone 11 days after she was taken. She was walking outside of one of the places where she was held and I was just walking down the side of the road over and over again just saying send somebody, send somebody and then a cop drove by me that Oklahoma City cop turned around, he pulled up next to me and he goes, are you Natalie Kramer? And I was like, yes, being found that was definitely God being like, I'm not going to give up on you. I'm not, I'm not going to let you die. So now she's using her life to help people understand teens who are struggling. Natalie had run away from home before this incident and again, after from treatment facilities, why were you running? Um I was running for attention. I was running for drugs for me. A lot of it was my mental health. I wasn't in therapy. I was struggling with self harm. I was, I was struggling with friends. I was struggling in school and even now I still don't know the reason, I don't know the, the reason of why I did the things I did and why I didn't do the things I didn't do. Like why I didn't call, why I, why I didn't just stop running. What she does know is what it feels like to need help and the response that can make a difference, making sure you're an emotionally safe person. So if you go up to a kid and you're like, hey, what's wrong? They can be like, you know, I'm really struggling right now. That had made a difference. That's why her parents started Ashland to provide support and resources for trafficking and sexual assault survivors. Natalie sits on the board. What are you hoping to bring to this um healing and my voice? Like if they can't speak for them, I'm going to speak for them. Not only story has made many headlines, but her title now is Survivor. It's all because of my family and my voice friend and my dog. He's my best friend. He saved my life too. Your mom has been advocating for you. He's never stopped fighting for you. What does that mean to you? She had to be there in order to save my life and she has, she has saved my life completely. Yeah, multiple people were charged and sentenced in Oklahoma for their involvement in trafficking. Natalie, her family is still hoping for justice in Dallas. One of the men Natalie was seen walking around with the night she disappeared, was arrested, accused of luring her from the arena and assaulting her. This person had actually been charged with promoting prostitution of minors before in the Houston area. But a grand jury in Dallas County decided not to prosecute him. We have much more on that part of their fight for justice right now on W faa.com.