Crawford County Jail
The 22-year-old victim, who has special needs, was allegedly lured from the home by an offer to meet Luke Bryan, before she was zip tied, tied to a tree and left in a field.
An Arkansas mother is accused of staging a faux kidnapping of her own adult daughter -- one her husband says was both "ill-conceived" and "poorly executed."
Tamara "Tammi" Hamby, 59, has been charged with endangering an incompetent person and conspiracy to commit kidnapping, after allegedly recruiting three other people to help teach her 22-year-old daughter, who has special needs, a lesson about the dangers of speaking to others online. Her three alleged accomplices -- Shannon Childers, David Quach and Nico Austria -- were also arrested in connection to the case.
The suspect's husband, Jeffrey Hamby, spoke with 5NEWS about the charges she's facing, claiming he knew nothing about the plot while also defending his wife's behavior.
"She has a lot of needs," Jeffrey said of their daughter. "She has a reactive attachment disorder and epilepsy. She is 22 and beautiful and has the mind of about an 11-year-old."
Per Jeffrey, the young woman believed she was speaking with Luke Bryan online -- with the parents fearing for her safety.
"The predator developed a relationship with her, and he said he was Luke Bryan, the singer. And my daughter adores him," he continued. "So, over the last six months, he's developed somewhat of a trauma bond, now that we've been able to see the chats and the messages, and he was attempting to obtain her or get her."
He claimed the catfish even convinced the daughter to cover the cameras in their home with tape, saying the woman still found ways to talk with him, even after they took her devices from her.
"We tried everything, and she has not stopped communicating with him, and he was going to get her. He was going to take her," insisted Jeffrey. "And so, my wife, without my knowledge, with her aide and a couple of their friends, tried to do an intervention ... we wanted to show her that evil does exist, and now she's in DHS custody, and my wife is facing jail time."
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View StoryJeffrey told the outlet that his wife and the other suspects did a practice run of the "kidnapping" earlier in the day on November 17, before they set what he called their "ill-conceived" and "really poorly executed" plot in motion. Per an arrest affidavit via the Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette, Hamby allegedly recruited Childers, who was one of her daughter's caregivers, to assist, before Childers also added two friends, Quach and Austria, into the mix.
It was Austria who allegedly lured the victim from the home by telling her he could arrange a meeting with Luke Bryan. Per Jeffrey, the suspects told the woman, "Luke sent us. It's not or never" -- before the victim "willingly" followed them to their vehicle. They then allegedly took the victim to a field nearby and, while wearing ski masks, asked her for money.
They also allegedly zip-tied her hands and tied her to a tree, before the victim wriggled free, was tackled to the ground and tied up again ... all as Hamby allegedly watched from a distance. While the plan, per authorities, was for Tammi to rescue her daughter and warn her of the dangers of talking to strangers, her daughter broke free again, ran to a nearby home, before the homeowners called 911.
"They had practiced earlier that day with these zip ties to leave them loose so she can slip them off. Instead, in the struggle to get away, she tightened the zip ties, and it bruised her wrists," Jeffrey said.
The four suspects turned themselves in last week; none of them are still in custody. According to Law & Crime, the victim, meanwhile, was reportedly taken into the custody of the Arkansas Department of Human Services. Hamby's next court date is set for December 10.
