GREEN BAY (NBC 26) -- An international phone call helped save a Green Bay woman's life as she was being held captive about 2,000 miles away.
“I never expected this to happen,” said Tracy Ertl, the Communications Supervisor for Brown County Public Safety.
It’s a rare occurrence that the Brown County Dispatch Center gets an international call. The nonemergency line rang Sunday afternoon. The voice on the other end was a Green Bay woman in danger, being held captive in the Dominican Republic.
“You could hear the chaos in the store, in the background, a lot of activity,” said Ertl.
The woman said she had met a man online and went to meet him. That's when things took a turn. She told Tracy Ertl and her team at the dispatch center she'd been there since October, with only a few chances to escape and get help.
“She was held in a house that was secured with chains,” said Ertl.
The team stayed on the line with her for three and a half hours, having to work around poor reception, as the woman was calling off an app nearly 2,000 miles away.
“To hear it sometimes is worse than seeing it, the mind will fill in what you won’t actually see,” said Ertl.
It was Ertl's first time in 27 years on the job she had to make a call to the U.S. embassy, never giving up hope to rescue one of our own.
“She’s one of ours, she’s from the east side of Green Bay, and just went over for a visit and found herself in that situation.”
Ertl says the U.S. embassy tells her the woman is now safe, but this situation is a growing concern that hits too close to home.
“She’s what we're seeing a lot of now,” said Ertl. “Human trafficking in different forms.”
Ertl also raised the importance of online dating safety, making sure to always meet in a public space and let someone know where you are.
Thankfully, with her team's quick thinking and response, a green bay woman is now safe.
“My team saves lives every day, every day. Every night.”
The other important lesson this brings up, Ertl said, is the fact that different countries have differend emergency numbers or none at all. Before you travel outside of th U.S., she said it is extremely important to know how to call for help where you'll be staying.
