Gone: The Disappearance of Aeryn Gillern (full doc) murder mystery

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let's just start off with the simple stuff what is your name my name is Kathy Killoren so when did you become a police officer I became a police officer August 19th 1985 and I was a police officer for 21 years at the Ithaca Police Department what do you think makes a good police officer I think what makes a good police officer is being able to empathize with the people that you're dealing with I think police culture for the most part has us versus them mentality and if you do that then you can't be a good police officer I think you have to be able to somehow go with the adage of there but by the grace of God goes me whether it's it's the it's the bad person you're arresting or the victim of a crime it could be you or it could be someone that you love we heard from a very impressive young police woman who was hired as a community police officer and she talked about the difference that has made in the lives of the people of this community okay let's move on now to talk about a little bit what do you think about Eric what are the first words that come to your mind [Music] gone I last saw Aaron September 20th 2007 he had been home for ten days Aaron Aaron who's a big boy he was about six foot two very muscular more size 13 and a half show and he did all his shopping at JC Penney's and so he had to come home every couple of years to do his shopping and so we ran from one Penney store to the other for the 10 days that he was here and the last time I saw him was when I took him to the airport [Music] he was very happy I had our two foster kittens here when when he was here and he had never been a cat person and he fell in love with this one little kitten Wolfie his favorite place in this area is the plantations at Cornell and we ended up going there three times while he was here and then he spent some time with my mother and we spent time just talking watching some movies and definitely shopping Aaron loved to shop I remember him calling and I was thinking about it the other day because I remember laughing when he called me and it had to be I think 1999 maybe and I had known he was gay since he was a teenager and it was just Aaron was gay and that was it it wasn't anything we talked about it he didn't talk about it so I didn't talk about it but I knew he was gay so when he called the nice is why I have something very important to tell you and I said what is it nice is why I'm gay and I started laughing and he says I can't believe you're laughing at me yeah I said well what other response would you want I said I know your days is you do oh who else knows I said well grandmother knows he says she does he's a little dammit I wanted to call her and tell her I said what call her I said give me five minutes I'll call her and tell her to act surprised oh I called her just look of course Aaron's gay and I said well act surprised so she did and then he called me back an hour later he says oh it was great he says she pretended she didn't know it was just hello Aaron [Music] Aaron had encouraged me to put the house on the market which I did and so one of the things that we did when he was home in September of 2007 was talk about me coming to live with him once I sold the house he wanted me to come and stay with him in Vienna for six months in common experience what it was like living in Europe so that was the plan you know moved to Vienna stay with him he had things for me to do people for me to meet and he was gonna keep me busy and it was gonna be quite the experience so these plans were in the works oh yeah they were definitely in the works we had plans on October 27th I called him to let him know that I had had some people look at the house but I still had no offers so we talked about me coming over to Vienna for the first week of December for seven to ten days and we talked about going to the Christmas market into the plinths Festival and and he loved that and so I was looking forward to that October 31st 2007 I was the director of the Courtland County SPCA and I was at work it was about 1:00 or 1:30 in the afternoon and the secretary from the Ithaca Police Department who I was friends with calls me and told me that I needed to go home that there was a phone message waiting for me and I said what do you mean she's his Cathy you need to go home and I could tell by her tone of voice that something had happened and I kept pressing her and finally she started crying and told me that Aaron was missing and I just jumped up and told everyone I had to go home and drove home very quickly and there was a message on my answering machine [Music] there was a message from Paul Miceli who was the assistant HR director and you need Oh telling me that Aaron was missing I immediately called mr. Masoli in Vienna he told me that Aaron didn't come to work he hadn't been seen since October 29th when he left and signed out at 6:00 p.m. and the errand had never missed worked before that he had taken days off and taken vacation or sick time but he always called in and they knew Tuesday when he didn't call in and didn't show up that something was wrong and then they were also alerted by his partner that he was unable to get ahold of them I then called Posse and at that point they knew nothing he and Umberto who was my son's upstairs neighbor knew nothing they had called around to various friends of Aaron and nobody had seen or heard from him a bear through the upstairs neighbor had Aaron's apartment key so they were able to go into his apartment they saw where he had a load of wash in and the apartment was exactly the way Posse had left it because Posse had spent the weekend with Aaron and it left the morning of the 29th prior to Aaron going to work they were able to call around to some people and they called a friend of Aaron's Georg and Georg told them that he would call people in NC Georg was able to talk to someone who had heard secondhand that the aaron had been at the kaiser Brendel sauna on the evening of October 29th and pasta and Umberto immediately went to the sauna and spoke with the manager Gunther and Gunther told them he did not see what happened but that there had been a fight that he understood there was a fight with tourists and he had called the police and that the police didn't respond that an ambulance had came and someone had you and he just kept on saying someone had to go to the hospital in the ambulance and he told them it was at 10 o'clock at night and that aaron ran out of the sauna and they didn't know whether he was injured or not but he had been in the vicinity of the fight [Music] so prior to me going to Vienna I left on November 1st the day after I heard about this information I knew that my son was missing and that something had happened to him at the sauna [Music] I do remember the flight over to Vienna it was very surreal I remember thinking that I was going to visit Aaron and in being very calm considering because I kept on thinking that Aaron was gonna meet me at the airport [Music] I had only booked the flight for a week because I thought I'll spend a couple days with them and find out you know what happened and all was he hurt and and then then I'll come home and then just make plans to go back over there in December of our early Christmas I didn't want to believe that there's something had happened to him I just wanted to believe that everything was gonna be okay when I arrived in Vienna passi met me and we took the train in and of course I had lots of suitcases when we were approximately five minutes away from the apartment Umberto called and said that there were two investigators at Aaron's door so this is Aaron's building here and passi told them that we would be there immediately you know don't open the door until we get there so when we arrived with two investigators and Umberto we're standing outside of Aaron's apartment door my first impressions of them were not good they wouldn't look at me there was no eye contact whatsoever they didn't say anything to me they just glanced at me and then turned toward the door and waited for Umberto to unlock the door they walked in and you could see under his bed from the doorway but they walked in and made a point of getting on their hands and knees and looking under the bed there was nothing under the bed you could see that and then they walked into his living room and they pulled out the sofa couch and then we were standing in the doorway and then they came back to the doorway and they spoke to Umberto and America as me for my passport and the one took the passport and start writing down information and the other one just stood there so I said to him I said do you speak English and he shrugged then yeah and I said I pulled out my my police retirement badge and I said I am a retired police officer in an America police officers take care of police officers and you just went and that was it as a police officer I rifles I was amazed I was shocked and I was angry at the fact that they never greeted me and that they did this cursory search it was it was ridiculous we take you down into the basement where Aaron kept his bike I just had this sinking feeling that this just as bad as I knew it was it was it was gonna get worse [Music] after Umberto and the investigators left Posse and I went immediately to UNIDO which is just two train stops away from my son's apartment we met with mrs. Anton Apollo who was the director of HR 4 you need oh and mr. Miceli in a few other people and they all shared concern again that Aaron was missing that this was totally unlike Aaron and mrs. Anton Lupin Lola said let's let's call the police should we call the police and I said I think that's a good idea so we went into mrs. Anton Rupa Lowe's office alone just her and I and she called the police department and she spoke to investigators ice who turned out to be the investigator who was at my son's apartment just two hours or so before that and who had had said yeah when I asked him if he spoke English she put him on speakerphone and she asked him what had what they think had happened to my son he said that they had searched the Danube canal which is different than the Danube River because a fisherman had called them at 20 after 8 on October 29th and said that he saw a bald-headed man float by in the river he told her that at 20 after 8 they received the phone call from the fishermen and that they immediately dispatched the scuba team the k-9 unit the fire department and that the scuba team went into the water and searched for my son and that they dredged the canal and that the k-9 unit's searched the area and the fire department also did a walking search and then at 10 of 9 exactly half an hour after the phone call they cleared the scene [Music] and she was listening to this before she started translating this she kept on shaking her hand and in writing me notes this doesn't make sense this is this this just doesn't make sense she just kept on writing that over and over again so I thought that they had searched the sauna around the sauna so I said well ask him if they used my son's clothes to search around the sauna and his reply to her is why would they search around the sauna he said the sauna doesn't matter it doesn't you know it doesn't matter it doesn't matter he just kept on saying that over and over again because she'd write it down and then she'd translate it to me and so they were totally disregarding the sauna which was like wait a minute you know that his belongings were at the sauna and in your mitten not making this connection anywhere I said how could they have done all this in half an hour I mean it takes time just suit up it takes time to get there you know and I told her I said ask him about the k-9 unit and what did they have to search for my son you know if they didn't know it was my son how were they searching how did they put the dog on a scent and then he came back and you remember her rolling her eyes and she says well if he said that if you were really a police officer that you'd understand how canines work and and I thought of this this again that this is not good and then the story changed - well the fisherman saw you didn't see a bald-headed man he saw a body float by and he called the police so I mean within you know a matter of an hour the story was starting to disintegrate [Music] [Music] I was at Aaron's apartment I was asleep November 3rd in the morning and I see and I'm very tall woke me up and told me that lieutenant Ornstein who was the security person who was being the liaison between the UN and the police was on the phone as soon as I answered the phone he told me that I needed to get in touch with the embassy immediately and I said why what's going on he said there's something wrong the the police are changing their stories he said there's something wrong I don't know what it is but you need to get in touch with the embassy immediately so I said ok and so he gave me a number so I wrote it down and I remember I went up I got up and I went to the bathroom and the phone rang again and it was a lieutenant on Stein again and he said have you called them I said well not yet he said you need to call them he said you need to call them immediately he said I just had another call from the police and the story has changed again he said something is terribly wrong he said they keep changing the stories and he said this is not good he said we need to do something else and he says I'm going to call them and he said we'll arrange for somebody from HR to go with you to the police department they'll call you and let you know what time the beating is going to be so that afternoon Sandra Posse and myself went to meet with the police and initially there were three plainclothes investigators in the office and two of them were smoking and I remember feeling quite nauseous the room was wasn't very big and I walked over to a window and I realized that someone was literally right on top of me and and I turned in one of the investigators was quite large was standing literally an inch behind me and Sandra who was bilingual said he doesn't want you near the window and I said well I'm not jumping out the window I just need air the smoke is bothering me she says he wants you to sit down and I said tell him I feel sick and so she did and he says he still wants you to sit down so I said okay so I went and I sat down and again I did my put my hands under my my legs and he stood right behind me and the only thing I could think of was that he was trying to intimidate me and I don't think I look dangerous you know I didn't think I looked like I was going to cause them harm and there was there was three of them there but it was it was just very uncomfortable then I asked for water and they didn't have any water and then I asked to go to the bathroom and they didn't have a bathroom and and finally I just couldn't hold it in any longer and I started crying tell me what that theory is just based on the conversation he had with them that day sitting there what are the dairy fairy is that he was in the sauna that there was some kind of disturbance and he ran out and committed suicide because because he's gay he's emotionally unbalanced he's HIV positive and gays are all these things commit spontaneous suicide all the time in Austria and Posse says well I know he was regularly tested and he was an HIV positive in he received his results on October 29th you know when he was at work I know he was HIV negative and they said well how do you know this and uses because I talked to him and he ran out at 6:50 he ran out at 6:50 right he's telling them it's impossible he's telling them that he was SMS hit 20 minutes to age that Aaron had received a phone call from a friend of his our Nissa at 20 after 7:00 and talked to her for more than 10 minutes so he must have gotten off the phone with our Nissa and then smsed posse so the 6:15 thing is just it's impossible it's impossible so then the the investigator who is talking to posse then says well Aaron's time thing on his phone must be wrong so Sandra says in English and then says it to German to them she said that's impossible because you don't set the time on your your phone it's it's set by the right the company and and it's not something you change it is what it is I'm thinking this is utter bull crap you know they throw out that it wasn't he mr. gay Austria you know and they asked Posse did you know he was mr. gay Austria and Sandra turns to me and she says she looks at me and I remember her closing her eyes and calling at this she says and just basically through clenched teeth she says he wants me to ask you if you're proud that your son was mr. gay Austria and and I just sat there and I thought how much more surreal can this be and I looked at her and I just looked at the investigator and and and I put on probably the fakest smile I've ever done and I said extremely extremely proud [Music] everybody loved Aaron I mean everybody loved Aaron so him being homosexual was no big deal because he was still Aaron [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] he actually went to seminary after Franciscan University in Vienna and Graz but he was told that he could be a celibate gay priest but he'd have to be willing to preach against homosexuality and that's when he left the seminary because that just he couldn't do that [Music] I'm outraged I am I am I'm still in shock because I still because I still want to believe that Aaron's gonna walk in the door so part of me is saying part of me was thinking this doesn't matter what they say because Aaron's gonna walk in the door and the other part of me is something happened to my son and I'm never gonna know because they don't they don't give a damn they plain and simple don't give a damn [Music] the next day November 4th one of the other you need Oh people who just wanted to keep me busy and make sure I was eating came and picked me up and we walked the canal if you can go number than um if you can be more incredulous and we already are tired at that point I thought if Sharon's in the canal then I should find them and so we walked to the canal for as far as we could walk it and I just walked looking along the edge thinking that if he was there that maybe he was like caught on rocks or something but there weren't any fishermen and up furthers there was people walking there was a walking trail but not in that section because we walked down to that section and you could only walk a certain way and there was just beer bottles and glass and cigarettes and I didn't even saw a couple syringes down there so it was not a nice area and then we had to walk back up to street level and walk aways before you could walk along and where there was an actual walking path where people walk we walked along the trail here and got to the point little bit see down into the - the water was shallow around the edges and you could see tree branches and rocks and stuff no I have no idea who the fisherman was I have never seen the report the embassy asked for the report I've asked for the report and I have never seen the report the State Department asked for the report nobody's ever seen the report I've seen it in a pile across the table [Music] [Music] Vienna is a very pedestrian-friendly city and people are constantly walking around even after the shops are closed people are walking around doesn't matter what the temperature is people are sitting outside you'll see it's not unusual to see people sitting with the sheep sheep blind you know chairs sitting outside having their their coffee because it's very outdoor place to be people are just always around I never was out there without people all around me and the in the Keyser Brundle is located probably two blocks off the the cart nurse rasa which is one of the main shopping tourist areas in all these little side streets have shops and restaurants and coffee houses in churches you know directly across the street from the kaiser Brundle is a church which has an evening mass so there's people coming to mass you know kitty-corner to it is physic as a coffeehouse I was never out there alone never I asked the police if they had any witnesses and the answer was no there was no other witnesses just just the fishermen and the fisherman's story changed from a bald-headed man within I think a couple was it a day or two changed to or might have been the same day change to a body floating to a screaming a splash to a splash to a scream - well a scream in the distance right now you're standing in front of the Kaiser Brundle I'm now going to make the walk that supposedly the police coming and how Aaron got to the canal they decided this route I don't know this is a restaurant of carriers if you're going in and out of the restaurant or walking dogs I'm walking past the Franciscan Church obviously I'm not running as they said Aaron was and walking history as I can as you can see on the left this is a restaurant all glass tin was sitting at window this is the cross street that even if Aaron had come down from the Kaiser Brundle one block off you mean the direction I'm facing he would have had to cross this busy street pedestrians it's the troyzan squats down there [Music] this way it's late Aaron would've crossed here eight not just ours but jump from here down to there I would think would be pretty mainland [Music] and November 6 I got a call from lieutenant Ornstein saying that I should meet him at the UN that we were going to go to the police department and pick up Aaron's belongings [Music] so I went to uni DOE and met with him and he was very quiet and we went to the police department the same Police Department and investigator vise was there and there was another investigator there the one who had on who had been typing up the report when he was talking to bossy he sat over in the corner and he just sat there with his head down an investigator vice just stood there and he had this huge plastic garbage bag on the floor and he pointed at it and lieutenant he said something do lieutenant understand no she kind said that's your son's stuff it's your son's belongings and so he sat down on the floor and I opened the bag and I could smell iron and I took his t-shirt out but I just kept smelling it and I couldn't stop crying and asked for Kleenex and Einstein ass investigator rice and said no and they told them I was gonna get sick and lieutenant I told him and he just shrugged his shoulders you gotta let me use the bathroom please so I can get sick in whatever lunchtime raised his voice it finally the investigator who'd been sitting over to the side got up and went like this one strike Toby to follow it I went to the bathroom it just kept getting sick and Shane said let's go and so I picked up this huge bag it was all my son and oh we went nobody said anything to us and we're walking down the street and Undine told me he says I can't help you anymore and I just looked at it I said what Jesus you know I'm busy I've got a lot of stuff at work I've got stuff going out of my own personal life and I can't help you anymore [Music] so I just got on the train and had this huge bag it wasn't until later that night that I had the strength to open it and really look through it [Music] in his his bag I want to start going through his bag there was the printed lab report saying he was HIV negative [Music] and there was his phone and when I would I saw the phone I called the bear though who lived upstairs because I didn't want to touch it and break it and do something they would erase something and he came downstairs and he turned the photon and there were the phone calls they were there and the correct ID was on the phone and the correct time was on the phone calls at that point when you see the HIV before you know I know they're lying they're just they just don't care he's just a gay man he's not he's not Austrian and they just don't care they just don't care then just don't care or they're covering something up once I saw the phone and in the lab report saying he was negative I'm sickened I'm angry I'm and I'm scared because I don't know where to go with it I can't trust the police I've already met with the embassy and I know the Embassy's not gonna do a damn thing for me this is the consulate office this is where I had to sit with other people at a table strangers filling out forms with passports and talk about my missing gay son to the council general I believe her title is Constance Anderson this is where she said she'd pray for my son she grabbed your crucifix when I told her that he was gay I have the the security liaison person doesn't want to be involved anymore my son needs to work here yes right now it's for security you need Oh doesn't want to ruffle the feathers because they're a guest in Austria so although they'll send translators with me they don't want to do anything else and and I met a loss I knew that I really had to pull it together as much as I possibly could and find out the truth because the police weren't gonna weren't gonna help me find the truth I mean he was my son and and if it took me for the rest of my life I was gonna find out [Music] so I just contacted people back here in the States and I had one friend who's still with the police department got in touch with an FBI agent who got in touch with an FBI agent who's a chargee d'affaires at the Embassy but the only thing that they do our X traditions they don't do investigations so they couldn't help [Music] and I just lucked into talking to a person who knew a person who knew a bookstore gay bookstore owner in Vienna so I thought well I got to start somewhere I had no idea where it was going to lead and I ended up going to this gay bookstore this is the university section and walking down the street it's a phaser where the rainbow crisis is the bookstore I remember walking into the gay bookstore and straight ahead of the door was a table with a book and I looked at it and I started crying because it was a book that Aaron had and these two men were behind the counter and they were like oh you know and one came up to me and I said I'm looking for for four yep he said leap I said leap and he says that's me and I told him I said I'm Aaron Gellhorn's mother and he looked at me says I know Aaron and this was again all before it had been in the press we sat down so he took me into the back and I just blurted out everything and he just sat there overwhelmed with all this and he said well let me make some phone calls and he says I'm gonna call somebody he said two weeks ago - well two weeks prior to Aaron's disappearance so around the middle of October the the police in Vienna started a Gay and Lesbian support group for gay and lesbian police officers to support them because of discrimination within the police department and also to train them to be leis ons with the gay community because the gay community gay and lesbian community was so mistrustful the police department so he said I know the person who's pretty much in charge of this you know he's a gay police officer and I'm gonna call him so he called him and Evod said he would come and meet me that night evil talked with me for about an hour I gave him all the information that I had had I told him about the two meetings that I had had with the police the one on the 3rd and the one on the sixth how upset I was at the treatment and so Evolved went into the book store side of this place and called a friend of his who worked at the call center which I assume is like a 911 did the call sender told him that there had been no calls in the first district on the 29th of October 2007 and urania who the area where the fishermen were are in the first district that the scuba divers were never sent out that the k-9 unit was never dispatched in the fire department was not dispatched and that no calls came in from the sauna that night either history if Aaron had come down from the Kaiser it just you know my mind was going in so many different directions as it was you know because I was constantly vacillating between anger and sadness and and just this emptiness in this this shock feeling of dullness were there was nothing affecting me and just this range of emotion and then to see this was like you know I had already felt uncomfortable with the police I already mistrust at the police and now it just confirmed it I just want answers I want the truth I want justice I want my son most of all I just want my son you know everybody tells me to hold and it's a very scary thing to hang on to on November 13th he had a meeting with the police and the evil had arranged it through someone he didn't tell me who but somebody high up in the ranks he said you know I've gotten ahold of somebody who's very interested in this and this is a person who helps start the gay and lesbian support group and they will have someone at that meeting and you'll be okay I said alright so myself and Angelica radix who is the psychologist at uni doe went to again the same building the same room where I was given my son's belongings we went in with these stairs we started off the meeting with Angelica saying to the investigator that set to my right we would like it very much if you would only talk for a minute or two and then give me time to translate and then talk again so that Aaron's mother can understand what's going on and if she has any questions she can ask and he looked at her and just shook his head and he said no and he said something to her in German and she would see her shoulder slump in show up to me she says no he will conduct the meeting the way he wants to so this investigator just started just talking just non-stop talking and I kept on saying go what's he saying she's hold on hold on I said what's he saying and and I was getting frustrated and finally I said this this is unacceptable this is unacceptable and at that point this is probably ten minutes into this meeting lieutenant I met her stands up he said you're unacceptable your behavior is unacceptable he says you are rude and I said I am unacceptable and I started crying I said I am NOT unacceptable I said I don't know what's going on what's being said I said you speak English and you're letting this man speak in German and not let her translate and you obviously now speak English but I told him I said you are unacceptable I said this is wrong and you know this is wrong any roll his eyes he said well then you don't understand you don't understand how an investigation works and you don't understand things like spontaneous suicide I said I do understand and I understand from talking to psychiatrists that there's no such thing as spontaneous suicide in and he comes over and he grabs the charity sits right down next to me puts his hands on my knees and I went like this and I pushed them off I said don't touch me do not touch me so he leaned forward and he said to me he said you used to be a police officer and I said that I said yes and he said what were you a parking meter maid and you went like that and I said no I was a police officer I was a neighborhood police officer so very cocky he says so do you have any more concerns I said excuse me they just didn't like the tone and he said do you have any more concerns you'd like to address with us seems like you have a lot of problems with the police I said I have a lot of questions and I have a lot of concerns but I don't think you're the one that I'm gonna go to with them and he's oh he says you'll run to somebody else and have them go above our heads [Music] then he he had written down notes and he said you need to sign this it was in German and I said I'm not signing it I'm not signing anything he says you have to sign it in Jellico radix the psychologist translator said you need to sign it said I'm not signing anything that I can't read and she's as well but I'm the translator and and I said I'm not signing it I said because he was writing down things that aren't true and I'm not signing it there's no way I'm signing anything and then he got distracted and we just walked up all this time there's been no press coverage of Aaron absolutely not I raised the question with lieutenant high mother about why there was no press coverage and he said that he didn't feel it was necessary and and I told him I said well how do you know that people didn't see something that someone might not come forward you know you know why wouldn't you put this in the press so they did and on the 20th it came out and the headlines were you know startling naked un diplomat runs naked through the streets mr. gay Austria gay this gay that spontaneous suicide and I know it's not fair to stereotype an entire country or a group of people but all I could think of was 60 years ago 64 years ago this is gently flats you know they were doing the same thing this is the memorial for all the Austrian Jews when they gave up the Jewish population when they gave up their homosexuals you know when they gave up their Jehovah's Witnesses when they gave up you know people who are insane you know as they turned it and it struck me that that caricature that they had painted along with much of Europe was the same caricature that they were using to paint my son and they made him small they just minimized them and just put all these labels on him so that he wasn't a real person anymore and they won't speak to me [Music] and they're turning my son into this this this creature not even a person to be mocked and then just to be he's gone every morning someone from uni dough would call me and get me up in the morning and view from the UN to Aaron's apartment I'd get up and I'd I'd go over I'd have some breakfast and they'd go over you neato if you entered I'd have lunged in the comedy series is an American film a great one like real milk instead of Austrian bill and I check and check my email and and and I'd talked to like Angelica radix the crisis psychologist and and then I'd I'd go home for a while back to Aaron's apartment since fairings mailbox 204 - 37 [Music] and you couldn't watch TV because I didn't know what they were saying and uh and then I'd get dressed real warm and I generally leave about five and I take the Obon to the to the last stop and I walk all the way back and then I'd stand in front of the Kaiser Brundle [Music] for about an hour or so and you know and if I got going earlier I'd go to the churches too if they were still open sometimes they stayed open later and had a routine and I think it was December fourth or fifth I went there and I was standing outside as normal as I did every night with the picture of Aaron and this young man came out and he spoke in halting English pieces Oh Aaron Aaron are you Aaron's mother and I said yes he's I know Aaron I know Aaron he says come on in come on in I said come in he's yeah come on Ethan I said I can't come in he saw it you can come in he had a woman by the name of Evelyn with him who was either American or Canadian and she translated and gus' Yin's only spoke German or so he said he did and he took me on the tour I shocked everybody by walking in and the men standing at the counter to check in to get their towels and slippers I mean they were standing there with their Hamburg hats and and they're very very well tailored clothing and you know immediately newspapers came up in front of their face probably thinking I was somebody's wife [Music] and actually I wanted to see it because I wanted to see the layout I wanted to see if there were video cameras I wanted to see what the place looked like and he kept on stopping and crying and at one point I reached out to touch his shoulder because I was trying to act very poised and like I just wanted to see the architecture and stuff and she it she said don't touch him don't touch him and I was like okay okay she says you just have to let him be she this is very hard for him and you know and I'm just keeping things inside thinking hard for him and then we got to this one room with murals on the wall and you stood there and you just kind of went like this and you start crying you went down on the floor and you just started doing this on the tiles and and I inside I was freaking out because I thought what is going on but I just I didn't want them to think that I was there trying to get information because then I knew they'd get rid of me so I was like what's going on what should we she says no this is the last place that he saw Aaron so he's like down on the floor down on the floor and you literally on the floor and he's rubbing the titles and then he gets himself up and he's crying and he's just holding himself like this and and we went through a few other rooms and then we went back upstairs and I asked her I said ask him what happened to my son and she just looked at me she's he doesn't want to talk about it she says you need to know she said that your son is gone and she said it doesn't matter what happened here your son is gone and I just like that I said but it does matter I need to know what happened to my son she says it doesn't matter what happened to him here your son is gone then she told me that he had a present for me and he gave me two polo tops that had Kaiser Brundle on it and and at that point I was ushered out that was it when you were on your tour did you see any video cameras there yes I did how many like where was that video there was video cameras at the entrance those video cameras downstairs and in one of the hallways so as a video camera I don't know that I don't know that the police ever looked at anything or interviewed anybody so do you think they know what happened yes I do believe that they know what happened I wanted to stay at his apartment I just wanted to move there and wait for him I couldn't pay the mortgage unit couldn't pay the rent at the same time over there the rent was coming due and and I couldn't get a job because I wasn't an Austrian citizen the only place that could work was at the UN and they didn't have a job for me and I was that wasn't in any condition to work it was terrible it was really bad I think the worst part even more so than getting on the airplane was packing up errands things and giving his things away shipping home what I could ship home I shipped home all those movies here but a couple hundred movies he loved movies and even CDs he loved music and I couldn't leave any fat stuff there and I couldn't give any of that stuff away but he I mean he had a home it wasn't just his apartment he had he had pots and pans and linens he loved to cook you know all kinds of cookware and you know I mean I probably got three nice and in Three Forks and three spoons and a couple glasses and he had he had he had home he had decorations in the end books you know cheese all over the place and he had pictures on the wall and I picked all the pictures and and I packed what I could but he had toasters he had mixers he had you know all these baking things he had a washing machine he had this table that he had picked out he had the sofa bed it is and you know all his furniture all these things are important to him [Music] oh yes loo even and I was just getting rid of all this stuff it that hurt the most because it's all I had left was just his material possessions there's a mine my stuff goes in my coats and stuff um again there's pictures there I always keep it to people and those pictures on a wall there let's see his room ah and you're there and there are the pictures with my mother and great-grandfather and there's your dad and you and Ramon there okay well this is when you come into the house here I'm at the front door oh there it is okay and there's the door to the room and his father up in the corner this is my closet this is you yeah I already had a great soaking tub it was real deep and big and I'd run the water real hot and I'd closed the door and and it shove a washcloth in my mouth it's a scream crying and crying and crying and crying so that's it for me I love you hope you guys are doing well come visit one day when you can know people actually watch the video hello loves kisses and talk to you later I [Music] just wanted to wait for him and I felt like I was abandoning him by coming home you didn't have a choice I had to come home when it came it's like I didn't know what I was gonna do I wanted to go right back for I had to stay busy because otherwise it was afraid it was gonna go nuts I was just gonna live with it I was just gonna go to counseling and and I didn't know what to do with it and I just dove right back into work I literally just don't back into work I'd work 1012 hours a day because I thought if I had exhaust myself you know and just keep busy with everything else get involved with all the drama at work with the employees with the animals that I wouldn't have to deal with it I was just this autumn a time that was going to work every day trying to exhaust yourself and then coming home every night and crying and crying and crying and literally the howling like a wolf was with so much pain and emptiness [Music] [Music] you know I tried reading reading reading it was real hard and I always loved reading but I read 10 pages and then put the book down the night the next night I didn't have to read 9 to be able to figure out what I had read the night before so I never got very far very fast [Music] all my friends kept on saying you got to talk to someone this you know talk to this newspaper talk to that call this we're gonna call this and I'm like nope because they didn't trust the media I was afraid that they were gonna hurt him and he'd already been hurt and minimized and I couldn't let anybody else hurt him I had to protect him and it meant keeping it out of the media that I was gonna keep it out of the media [Music] and then in joke in June the board changed at the SPCA in a July they were gonna fire me playing it simple I didn't fit into their their clique and so I resigned and I spent two weeks really weepy and depressed and everything because it was like oh my god I have no structure now I have nothing all I have is this going around in my head I had I had a rule my counselor hates that I had this rule but it was like I don't cry before four you know look credible look look sure of yourself look strong whatever and I and I tried to keep that rule in effect for those seven months that I was in share avoidance and then there wasn't anything to hide behind anymore when I didn't have the job at the shelter there was no more walls for me to hide behind and then I realized that this isn't just gonna go away I started making phone calls and letting people know and my friends were very helpful and knew that this was what I needed to do knew that this was the healthiest thing for me to do a miraculous medal a race number a bear sewed in eighth grade and a video mementos of a sudden Cathy Gillen hasn't heard from since October after several attempts to contact the Austrian police Cathy Gillard finally got a one-page response in May stating that her son was reported missing along with his case number she says the US State Department is unable to force another government to further investigate so right now she's just praying for a miracle Cathy Gillen will be in Austria on October 29th the one-year anniversary of her son's disappearance and she plans on making this trip every single year until she brings him home why don't you return to Vienna because I missed Aaron because I felt Aaron and because Aaron's in Vienna sometimes home someplace so beautiful bring back so much pain here tell me about the vigil that you held at the vigil was just a very subdued one just very quiet I had it directly across the street from the Kaiser Brendel Sun sauna which is probably only like maybe 20 feet it's just literally across a one-lane Street that's it but the sauna didn't want me to interfere with their business and wanted me to take my my sadness and affection somewhere else so I took it across the street in the side doorway of the Franciscan Church and the Franciscan Church was the first time I went to visit Aaron was the first church that he took me to there was a couple churches that he really liked when we came here that night the first night that I was here behind everything maybe several people from the that we're going into the Sun are coming out of the sauna came over because we had his picture and they came over and they talked most in English you know remember Aaron we had great discussions with Aaron Stockton said that they were praying that they were three when they in one hand speaking you those walked by and ready to ask some questions it was just very nice that people stopped by but one of the strange things that happened again it didn't hit me until I don't think it hit me till I got home we were standing there is that all of a sudden there was a priest standing in front of me and and I looked and they said I hope it's okay that we're standing here and he said oh no sure sure so it is it is and in and again it didn't hit me till I came home he was Irish and how bizarre was that here was his Irish priests in Vienna and and he says I'm praying for him I'm praying for Aaron it was just very odd because he had just walked up and he looked at me he didn't look at the signs he just walked up and looked at me and he said Aaron the name in my mind I like to imagine that Aaron sent him you know and he knew I'd get a kick out of an Irish face so I think that was just something special that he did for me what I did learn after I came back I had met with a reporter Joseph kept from the falter and he did two articles for the newspaper and in it he says that there were no witnesses because this is what the police have always said that there's no witnesses except for the fishermen and the next day he had an email from a university student that said he saw Aaron that he and his girlfriend saw Aaron and Joseph wrote to me says I'm not sure whether to believe them or not this is the ubon station the students were standing somewhere around here and saw Aaron running up these steps initially when Joseph emailed me and told me that people had seen my son running my whole belief system fell apart because then I was like have I been in denial did he jump up from the sauna and doesn't run jump into the canal and Joseph bawled them and then he met with them and they were out walking they saw Aaron run near near the Kaiser Brundle naked covering his privates and the girl they they said that they thought that maybe it was a college prank or something so the girl did the worthless and that Aaron stopped in turn and looked at him according to the witnesses this is approximately where they saw Aaron and they were over there and the way they described it to Joseph is that they've never seen anyone look so scared in their life [Music] I wrote a microtome plain and simple I said so did he commit suicide Annius suicide you wrote back he says nobody says that he said except for the police he says don't don't go there he said something happened something happened to your son something happened at the sauna and after that we're gonna have to figure out what happened then aneesa's but irregardless he says if your son ended up in the canal he says it wasn't his choice [Music] what's interesting is when Joseph presented this information to the police the police said no there weren't any witnesses these people are lying so these people said that they didn't call the police but on the 20th when they saw it in the newspaper the next day they called the police that the police sent over to investigators and that they gave a statement and the police say no they're lying so these people are either credible enough or stupid enough the gentleman was anyway to give his name and allow Joseph to do another story including the man's name saying what the man saw and the man saying I don't know why the police would say that nobody came forward and like Joseph said he says I believe him and he said he's willing to give his name and willing to speak out against the police and that's that's huge there that is absolutely huge why lie about a witness why would you lie about someone coming forward and saying they saw him if they had told me back back then I would have went like this I I would have stopped and said jeez what are we missing what are we missing them let's let's concentrate on the unde the goddamn Sun and find out what happened there etc etc etc I think this was entertainment for them they weren't afraid to change a story like that in front of other people they weren't afraid of telling things that couldn't possibly be true in front of other people they weren't afraid of showing like the SMS things and in saying in front of other people in reconstructing it they weren't afraid of doing any of this and that's what's so scary I know from being a police officer it's a whole lot easier to show up at a crime scene see a dead body and go yep suicide so you know I'm communicating with friends back home and they're saying you know hire a private investigator hire an attorney you need Oh sets me up with a freebie session with an attorney who speaks English well kind of and Andy tells me he's as well you know put your police hat on and think about it he says you've got a gay sauna in the fanciest district of Vienna how do you think it existed this long he said don't you think there's somebody connected to the sauna in government or the police department or whatever and I'm thinking yeah he says you'll never find the truth I've talked to several police and they all say the case was botched there's so many things wrong but they cannot talk about it for fear of their life that to me means something big but what that is and whether I'll ever find out I don't know and that's what scares me that I will have to live with not knowing I mean knowing is still gonna be difficult to live with because I still won't have Aaron but not knowing is just this perpetual limbo I met with the Green Party when I was in Austria thankfully Aaron had a very good friend Florian who came to the vigil and Florian has friends in high places so Florian arranged an interview meeting with me and two members of parliament one that deals primarily with police issues and one that deals specifically with gay and lesbian issues in the police and I met with them sent them all the information that I had they spoke to several people and they have filed an official inquest and it's been accepted by the Minister of the Interior or riaf Ector so when you heard that was going to be an inquest what did you immediately think I was excited I was I was excited that the Green Party was even interested in in doing anything that they were that they were outraged you know the things that I had told them the way the police had acted so I thought this was going to be a really good thing I was very excited about it [Music] [Music] my hopes where the truth was gonna come out that the police were gonna have to admit that they lied admit that they had fabricated that they manipulated information and that they had treated the case badly that they had defended my son that they had treated me bad in an Aaron's absence they had treated him deplorably [Music] an inquest is from what I understood from the Green Party is supposed to be an external review of what the police department did or didn't do what happened was it was turned over to the police department to review themselves in the inquest the police say that they did not respond that the fire department did and that the head of the fire department unit that responded decided that the water current was going too strong to put divers in the water so the divers didn't get dispatched to the scene and that they cleared they didn't dredge they didn't go in the water they didn't put boats out he didn't ask for a k-9 unit they didn't do anything it totally absolved the police of any involvement whatsoever I walked around I mean it was it was early in the day and I ended up just walking around and I didn't have anything planned for the rest of the day I didn't feel defeated I can't say I was any more depressed and I was over over you know any other news from the police because it wasn't unexpected [Music] Aaron loved Vienna everything about it the people got dressed up that was a big thing Vienna was his his literal cup of tea because he could get dress up and he could walk around and and feel proud of himself he loved the culture he loved the architecture he loved everything about it just the fact that it was old that it had tradition and we went around and he showed me all the buildings that he loved [Music] [Music] missionary shaking he loved the history of it the hapsburgs the kaiser and CC and and all that that's an old satchel [Music] we went to the Hapsburgs palace and in just everything he just he just loved it and and I appreciated it I do feel that I'm trying to prove that I'm right and they're helping what do they know it or not I mean you know a wall get knocked down or maybe even just a brick gets loose in the wall but they they do it themselves you know a little a little you know tap on the wall and something will fall and something else will come into place that will substantiate what I knew the first or second week after Aaron disappeared what I knew what I felt and and then they come for him alone yes this well yes this well know this and it's like gee well that's what I've been saying all along [Music] I guess my hope is that keep it going I'll just keep on knocking more bricks out and my ultimate hope is that somebody develops a conscience at some point and comes forward a police officer can't look at himself in the mirror anymore it says I know what happened [Music] a mother here in central New York is searching for her son he disappeared three years ago Caitlyn New Clothes reports Kathy Killoren is packing her bags and setting off on a search to find out what happened to her son I once was told that justice delayed was justice denied so at this point I don't know if there's gonna be any justice okay all I can fight for is the truth and hopefully being able to bring Aaron home [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] thankee [Music] the price [Music] to speak [Music] to [Music] Carrie [Music] you [Music] you

Info

Channel: Popcornflix

Views: 672,728

Rating: 4.6765571 out of 5

Keywords: gone the disappearance of aeryn gillern, aeryn gillern, gone documentary, Gone 2011 full movie, gay murder mystery documentary, Popcornflix documentary, best lgbt documentaries, murder mystery documentary, Gone 2011, full documentary movies, lgbtq, free movies on youtube, free documentary movies, missing person documentary, Full movies English, lgbt movies, free full length movies to watch on youtube, watch full documentary, free movie on youtube, Popcornflix

Id: ncP_JYqQUZU

Channel Id: undefined

Length: 85min 25sec (5125 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 23 2018

Reddit Comments

If anyone found any alternative source we can watch please let us know.

👍︎︎ 150 👤︎︎ u/panupatc 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

Im surprised how alone she is. No victim rights groups, no gay rights group. Just her standing on a street with candle and photo trying to get info.

👍︎︎ 250 👤︎︎ u/grambell789 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

Amazing + horrifying.

👍︎︎ 157 👤︎︎ u/weaviez 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

Any theories as to what happened?

👍︎︎ 31 👤︎︎ u/xcvxcxcxcvxcxvxcxxx 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

vid down -.-

👍︎︎ 48 👤︎︎ u/Eiterbirn 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

I swear the documentary production crew are as important as the police on a murder investigation these days

👍︎︎ 102 👤︎︎ u/dirtybuster 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

That poor woman. I hope one day she can find some closure.

👍︎︎ 26 👤︎︎ u/olddevilwind 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

[removed]

👍︎︎ 137 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies

I'm a bot, bleep, bloop. Someone has linked to this thread from another place on reddit:

[/r/wien] [x-post, frontpage] "Gone - The Disappearance of Aeryn Gillern (2011)"

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👍︎︎ 10 👤︎︎ u/TotesMessenger 📅︎︎ Apr 01 2019 🗫︎ replies