A missing Wisconsin woman abducted by her ex-husband was found alive but severely beaten Sunday inside a garbage can in a Wheeling storage facility, police said.
The muffled cries of Teri Jendusa-Nicolai (the name as published has been corrected here and in subsequent references in this text), 38, of Norway, Wis., were heard by a Public Storage employee who had been asked to search the facility in the 900 block of South Milwaukee Avenue after police said they learned Jendusa-Nicolai’s ex-husband had rented space there.
Jendusa-Nicolai had been stuffed partially clothed inside a 3-foot-tall green plastic garbage can hidden under some boxes in a 4-by-8 foot unheated unit, police said.
“I believe he left her for dead,” Racine County Sheriff Robert Carlson said of Jendusa-Nicolai’s ex-husband, David Larsen, 39, an air traffic controller. The couple had a history of domestic problems and filed for divorce in November 1999, Carlson said.
“It was a difficult marriage and even more difficult divorce,” he said.
Jendusa-Nicolai likely was in the unheated storage unit for at least 18 hours, police said. Temperatures outside dipped to 12 degrees overnight.
She was listed in serious condition late Sunday at Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge.
“She’s alive and recovered. And for that, we are profoundly grateful,” Carlson said, adding that police believe she was beaten with some sort of weapon.
Larsen was being held by Wheeling police Sunday on a charge of false imprisonment. Other charges likely will be filed Monday against him, police said.
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The frantic search for Jendusa-Nicolai and her two daughters began Saturday at about 11 a.m. when she called 911 from Larsen’s home on Oak Ridge Drive in Norway and reported she was having trouble breathing. Jendusa-Nicolai and Larsen shared custody of their two daughters and she had gone to his home to pick them up, Carlson said.
Police and paramedics went to Larsen’s home but found no one there. They became concerned because a neighbor saw Larsen towing his wife’s car behind his truck, Carlson said. They became more alarmed when Jendusa-Nicolai’s current husband called police to say his wife had called him from her cell phone to say she was being abducted, he said.
An Amber Alert was issued Saturday afternoon for the two girls–Amanda, 6, and Holly, 4. Shortly after that, Jendusa-Nicolai called 911 from her cell phone and told Milwaukee County sheriff’s dispatchers she was in the back of her ex-husband’s truck and she didn’t know where she was, Carlson said.
Larsen was arrested by Wheeling police just after 6 p.m. Saturday while he was driving to work at Palwaukee Municipal Airport, located about a half-mile from the storage facility. He was supposed to have started work four hours earlier, Carlson said.
He told police the children were at a baby-sitter’s home in Elmwood Park where police found the girls safe just after 9:30 p.m., Carlson said. They also found Jendusa-Nicolai’s car parked on a residential street in Milwaukee with the help of a citizen responding to the Amber Alert.
But Jendusa-Nicolai was nowhere to be found, and Larsen was not providing authorities with much help in their search for his ex-wife, Carlson said.
Wheeling Deputy Chief John Stone said Racine deputies had found documents related to the storage facility in a car in Wisconsin, though he was not sure whose car it was.
“We’re still piecing this all together,” he said Sunday.
The couple had a contentious relationship resulting in police often being summoned to their home.
Jendusa-Nicolai filed for a temporary restraining order against Larsen on Jan. 22, according to court records. The two were scheduled to appear in court Monday for a hearing, records showed.
Larsen and Jendusa-Nicolai shared custody of their two daughters, and Larsen had the girls for the last several days, Carlson said. The girls are now staying with Jendusa-Nicolai’s family, he said.
Larsen, who was employed by the Federal Aviation Administration, has worked at the Palwaukee airport for about two years, said airport spokesman Rob Mark. Before that, Larsen, who also is a licensed pilot and real estate broker, had worked as a controller at General Mitchell International Airport in Milwaukee, a FAA spokesman said.
“I can say that I always found Mr. Larsen to be professional and pleasant in his dealings with the public in his role as an air traffic controller,” said Palwaukee airport manager Dennis Rouleau in a written statement.
Jendusa-Nicolai is a doting mother whose first priority was spending time with her daughters, baking, reading and doing art projects, said Dawn Lett, who lived next door to Larsen and Jendusa-Nicolai when they were married.
Lett was relieved to learn Jendusa-Nicolai was found alive.
“She’s a real survivor,” she said.