In Plain Sight is the riveting inside story of the nine-month-long search for Elizabeth Smart, the Salt Lake City teenager who was kidnapped from her bed, revealing unsettling, never-before-revealed information about the flawed investigation and the mystery that mesmerized a nation. Paced like a thriller, this true account moves between the parallel stories of the searchers and the abductors. Tom Smart, Elizabeth's uncle, and reporter Lee Benson provide the first comprehensive look into how the police botched the investigation, the media's manipulation of the family, and the eyewitness testimony of nine-year-old Mary Katherine Smart, which went largely ignored by investigators. Elizabeth's eerie journey over the nine months and one week of her captivity, her near misses with the volunteers, detectives, media, and family members working to bring her home, and the painful reasons she wasn't found sooner are all vividly detailed. Interviews with more than 150 people involved in the search and investigation, notes from intimate family meetings, memos from law enforcement officials, and Smart's firsthand recollections illuminate the background of the disturbed street preacher Brian David Mitchell, who kidnapped Elizabeth as part of a bizarre polygamous plot. It also examines the critical role of the media, revealing the essential part played by John Walsh of America's Most Wanted and others in facilitating Elizabeth's safe return, and the manipulative influence of Fox News and Bill O'Reilly. This is an amazing testament to the selflessness and generosity of a community and to the astonishing strength of one family doing everything in its power to see Elizabeth return home.