Police in West Valley City, Utah used a series of search warrants and subpoenas to obtain copies of Susan’s emails and Facebook messages in the weeks following her December 2009 disappearance. The correspondence provided investigators valuable insight into her state of mind.
Police included redacted versions of those messages when they publicly released their case file in 2013.
The thousands of pages of messages revealed just how isolated, frustrated and trapped Susan felt in the years leading up to her disappearance.
In the time since, many of Susan’s friends came to see lessons in the conversations they once shared with her.
“As much as we all tried to help her get out and talk to her, keep pushing. Keep doing more,” Hardman said. “If you know someone that’s in a bad situation, use Susan as an example. Bad things can happen. You don’t want this to happen to anybody.”