I was almost kidnapped with 10 other girls in one night

When I was 17, I went to a 3 day metal festival. <br><br>Me and my 10 best friends were going to camp in a tent. I’m a girl and so are all of my friends. We have always been this close friend group, and it felt safe to be alone with all of my girls. <br><br>We set up our tent, and me and one of my friends got there earlier than the others, so we started searching for the stages. The festival was a bit off as there were a couple of men walking around with walkie talkies. We were talking to some other festival goers and they were telling us to be careful and not to go anywhere with anyone. We didn’t really think anything of it, we were mostly just excited for the festival.<br><br>That night, we all decided to go into the tent. Me and 3 other girls were still up while the 7 others had already fallen asleep. As we were sitting in the tent, a man pulled the zipper open and poked his head through the tent opening. <br><br>He introduced himself as one of the festival staff and started explaining how the festival was getting shut down due to bad weather. He said we should grab our stuff and pack up the tent and they’d put us in a hotel for free. We didn’t know what to do, but the one of my friends who was sharing a sleeping bag with me whispered to me that she didn’t think that this seemed right. <br><br>I whispered back, “I know, but we can’t just assume he’s lying. What if we don’t listen and the tent blows away in the wind?” I slowly started to pack up my stuff.<br><br>Then, I heard a voice, “No, no, no, no, no, no, no! We don’t need to pack up the tent. He’s lying.” It was one of our friends that had woken up because she heard the festival staff member talking. She had been to a festival the weekend before and the weather was also bad and they didn’t get put in a hotel. She knew this wasn’t normal festival protocol. <br><br>The staff member started to get agitated when we didn’t listen to him. He started yelling at us and saying that if we didn’t listen we would be blown away in the wind and get hurt. <br><br>I saw how visibly shaken up all of my friends were. We were 10 adolescent girls, alone in a tent, being yelled at by a grown man. I got so scared, I was shaking, I didn’t know what to do. Then I remembered the people we talked to telling us not to go anywhere with anyone. <br><br>I knew we had to get out of there. I told the festival staff member that we would pack up the tent and go to the festival information desk to find out more about what was going on. The staff member got so agitated he started to run off towards the other tents close by. <br><br>As soon as he was gone, I whispered to my friend to go to the car (which was parked a kilometer away) and go get help. Luckily, we had only packed up a little bit of our stuff, so we could tell the festival staff member that we had to go to the car to get a pump for the inflatable mattress so we could pack up the tent. <br><br>We walked towards the car, and my friend ran ahead and got in the car. The festival staff member saw her get into the car and he ran towards her. He started banging on the window, telling her to get out and that if we didn’t come back in 10 minutes he would call the police and get us arrested. <br><br>My friend was panicking, she locked the car and drove off slowly while the staff member was still hitting the windows. She drove towards the park where the festival was being held, she had to dodge the staff member as he tried to run in front of the car to stop it. <br><br>All of us got in the car and drove towards the festival entrance where the security was located. When we got there, we explained to the security guards what had happened. They apologized and said that they never announced the festival closing and they don’t have a protocol of putting people in hotels. <br><br>They told us to drive to a camp site that was a couple of kilometers away from the festival terrain, they would pack up our tent for us and we could sleep there for free. We drove to the camp site and talked about what had just happened. <br><br>We didn’t really understand what had happened and we didn’t really think that the festival staff member was going to do anything malicious to us. <br><br>It wasn’t until I got home, alone in my room, that I started to think more about what could’ve happened if the festival staff member would’ve abducted us. <br><br>I thought about how he would’ve taken all of us to a secluded area, where he could’ve murdered us. I thought about how our parents would never see us again. I thought about how it would’ve been even worse because my 2 best friends are sisters and they would’ve been taken away from each other. <br><br>I started crying and I called my mom and told her everything. She was so worried, she seemed angry with herself that she had let me go to the festival with all of my friends. <br><br>She convinced me to go to the police station with her to file a report. I didn’t want to, I was still very shaken up. I didn’t want to talk to anyone about it because it made me very uncomfortable. <br><br>But my mom told me that other girls might be in danger and that I was obligated to speak up. <br><br>I went to the police station and told them everything. They told me that a bunch of people had already filed similar reports. Apparently, the festival staff member had pulled up to a lot of tents where girls and young women were camping alone. <br><br>They never caught him. The police told me that they couldn’t do anything to find him, because there wasn’t enough evidence. <br><br>It’s been a couple of years now. I think about that festival every now and then. I feel very privileged that we were able to escape and that nothing bad happened to us.