Abducted In Plain Sight viewers call Jan Broberg's mother and father the "worst parents of all time"

30 January 2019, 20:58

Sam  Prance

By Sam Prance

People can't understand how Bob and Mary Ann Broberg enabled Robert Berchtold in the Netflix documentary...

TRIGGER WARNING: SOME OF THIS CONTENT MAY UPSET READERS

Netflix is really coming through with their content at the moment. Over the course of the past few months alone, the hit video streaming platform has blessed us with incredible films and TV series including the likes of Bird Box, You and Sex Education. It's already hard to imagine life without the likes of Malorie (an icon), Joe Goldberg (a creep) and Eric (the greatest character you will ever meet).

People are calling Netflix's 'Abducted in Plain Sight' the "most messed up" documentary ever

However, alongside all of its dramas and thrillers, Netflix is also becoming a key destination for true crime documentaries. The platform recently dropped its critically acclaimed Ted Bundy documentary series Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes and now the entire internet is disturbed and outraged by a 2017 doc they just picked up called Abducted in Plain Sight.

What did the parents in Abducted in Plain Sight do?

Abducted in Plain Sight tells the story of how Robert Berchtold kidnapped Jan Broberg twice
Abducted in Plain Sight tells the story of how Robert Berchtold kidnapped Jan Broberg twice. Picture: Netflix

Abducted in Plain Sight tells the horrifying true story of Jan Broberg, who was kidnapped twice and sexually assaulted more than "200 times" by a family friend named Robert "B" Berchtold in the 1970s. The entire documentary is difficult to watch but it's the details of Bob and Mary Ann's (Jan's mother and father) neglect of their daughter that viewers are particularly upset by.

Firstly Bob and Mary Ann let Berchtold share a bed with their daughter multiple times, knowing that he was being counselled for being attracted to children. Berchtold made them believe his therapist had advised him to work through his pedophilia by sharing a bed with Jan. If that wasn't bad enough, Bob also gave Berchtold a hand job and Mary Ann had an affair with him.

Perhaps worst of all, Bob and Mary Ann didn't press any charges against Berchtold after he first kidnapped Jan because his wife threatened to expose Bob's hand job and, as a result, he was free and able to kidnap her a second time. Taking all of this into consideration, it's no surprise that people are not warming to Bob and Mary Ann in the documentary.

Here are just a few of the reactions.

Abducted in Plain Sight itself is carried out via interviews with Jan and her family so we do get to see her parents' regret and remorse at their actions. Not only that but Jan has since forgiven them and helped them forgive themselves. That being said, given their neglect, it's understandable why the internet is less forgiving.

Abducted in Plain Sight is available to stream on Netflix now.