“[Cleo’s] nightmare nights are the worst nights, it’s just heartbreaking," Ellie Smith says.
“[Cleo’s] nightmare nights are the worst nights, it’s just heartbreaking," Ellie Smith says.
The kidnapping of Cleo Smith in 2021 had millions around the world transfixed as desperate authorities combed vast expanses of Western Australia for traces of the missing 4-year-old.
When detectives found her after 18 days, little Cleo’s first words had the world breathing a sigh of relief - but the ordeal was far from over, her mother has revealed.
Speaking for the first time since kidnapper Terence Kelly was sentenced, Ellie Smith and partner Jake Gliddon told 60 Minutes about how Cleo is coping with what happened to her in those missing days.
“She still has her sad nights, her nightmare nights, some things she just can’t explain,” Smith said.
“[Cleo’s] nightmare nights are the worst nights, it’s just heartbreaking.”
Cleo Smith and Jake Gliddon spoke of the fallout from the kidnapping. Photo / 60 Minutes
Meth-user Kelly stole the child away as she slept in a tent on a family camping holiday, holding her in his home to live out a bizarre fantasy of having a little girl he could play dress-ups with.
He let her roam the house when he was there but locked her inside a bedroom while he went to visit family.
He also tried taping her up and admittedly “smacked her a little bit” to keep her quiet as she begged to see her parents.
Cleo knew people were looking for her, hearing her name on the radio and declaring: “They’re saying my name!”
Ellie Smith says that knowledge still pains her.
“Obviously it hurts to know that she was crying out for help and we weren’t there,” Smith said.
“It hurts to know she was crying out for help and it was ignored.”
60 Minutes also played audio from Ellie Smith’s initial call to emergency services, pleading for help after she woke to find her daughter missing from her tent.
“Hi, umm, my daughter’s gone missing,” the desperate mum says.
“How old’s your daughter, love?” the operator asks.
“She’s four,” Smith replies, her voice cracking with emotion.
Ellie Smith told 60 Minutes that Cleo knew some of what had happened in court, where Terence Kelly was sentenced to 13 years and six months behind bars.
“She knows he’s a bad man. And he’s in jail now, so she’s safe,” Smith revealed, admitting it was hard to talk about the kidnapper and what he had done to their family.
“It’s disgusting, to hear that someone is capable of doing that to a child.
Still from video released by West Australian Police showing the moment 4-year-old Cleo Smith was rescued from a house in Carnarvon, West Australia. Photo / WA Police
“He had his fantasies and he was trying to make them come to life, you know, he wanted a daughter, he wanted a wife and he had all this, these different Facebook pages set up to be his family, he already had that … he needed it in real life,” Smith said.
“It just happened to be our tent that he got into.”
