Nevada family's secret life unravels

(AP Photo/Washoe County Jail via the Reno Gazette Journal)

In this undated photo provided by the Washoe County Jail, Nancy Dunsavage is shown. Authorities in Nevada arrested Nancy Dunsavage who has been wanted in New Jersey for 25 years for allegedly kidnapping her young daughter that was not in her legal custody. Washoe County sheriff's deputies say they arrested 57-year-old Dunsavage at a residence near Lake Tahoe after she confessed she was the woman wanted in the warrant.

RENO, Nev. — Melissa Reed was a proud fiancee applying for what she thought was a routine marriage license two weeks ago when she learned a stunning secret: She had been abducted as a child and living under an assumed name.
The woman was actually a former New Jersey girl named Eva Marie Fiedler who was 6 years old when she disappeared with her mother during a bitter child custody battle. The mother, Nancy Dunsavage, says she fled with her daughter and changed their names to save them from an abusive father.
The mother lived with the secret for all these years, but confessed to the double life when her 32-year-old daughter couldn't get a marriage license because she lacked proper identification. She couldn't bear to keep the secret any longer, knowing that she had deprived her daughter of a chance to get married.
"The wedding is set, the guests are committed and she cannot get a marriage license because she has no photo ID," said Dunsavage, also known as Debbie Reed. "This has brought me to the realization that we cannot continue living like this."
The discovery touched off a bizarre chain of events that has landed her 57-year-old mother in jail in Reno on a 1985 fugitive warrant out of New Jersey. Prosecutors in New Jersey want to bring her there to face charges in what they consider a parental abduction.

HOW ARE YOU NOT GOING TO TELL YOUR DAUGHTER WHAT HAPPENED AND HER FIND OUT AT AGE 32. AT LEAST SHE HAD THE GUTS TO GET HER CHILD AWAY FROM AN ABUSIVE FATHER. THIS JUST GOES TO SHOW WHAT PEOPLE HAVE TO DO TO SAVE A CHILD WHEN THE JUDICIAL SYSTEM CAN'T. WHEN YOU ARE ABUSED YOU ARE TOLD TO GET HELP FROM THE LEGAL SYSTEM BUT MOST OF THE TIME THE LEGAL SYSTEM IS SO BACKWARDS THEY REALLY CAN'T HELP AND IN INSTANCES ONLY MAKE IT WORSE. THE REASON WHY IS BECAUSE YOU ARE NORMALLY AROUND YOUR ATTACKER FOR YEARS AND THE LEGAL SYSTEM ONLY SEES YOU FOR A FEW MINUTES. THE LEGAL SYSTEM DOESN'T KNOW WHO YOU ARE OR WHAT YOU HAVE REALLY BEEN THROUGH AND WITHOUT THAT KNOWLEDGE YOU REALLY CAN'T BE GIVEN FAIR TREATMENT. THAT WHY SO MANY ABUSED WOMEN END UP DEAD. THEY REALLY CAN'T BE PROTECTED THEY HAVE TO PROTECT THEMSELVES AND BY THAT TIME IT IS AT THE END OF THE RELATIONSHIP.