BARRON, Wis. — On a Facebook page called "Healing for Jayme Closs,” thousands of people have been following the case of a missing Wisconsin teen found alive.
Audra Bennion has been advocating for missing people since 2010. She created a page called "Active Amber Alerts National” and that's how she heard about Jayme Closs' disappearance.
Just 24-hours after posting "Jayme’s" alert, Bennion says she knew she had to start a separate page solely for the missing 13-year-old. She's been working closely with Jayme’s relatives ever since.
Bennion says the "Healing For Jayme Closs" Facebook page is meant to be a positive place where people can go to get updates on the case. But her biggest goal was to raise awareness of who Jayme is and have as many people as possible see her picture.
"I felt the whole entire time that Jayme was alive,” Bennion. “She was out there somewhere and so the focus and the goal was find Jayme, and once we find Jayme, then we'll know , we'll have other answers, we'll know what happened, we'll be able to arrest somebody.”
Bennion says hearing the news Jayme was found was overwhelming exciting and a weight lifted off her shoulders. More than $51,000 was raised through a Facebook fundraiser to support Jayme as she begins to re-build her life.
Bennion is directing people to a GoFundMe set-up by a Closs family member as well as a fund at Sterling Bank in Barron, Wisconsin.
The Healing for Jayme Closs Facebook page currently has more than 75,000 followers. Bennion says if Jayme or her relatives would like to run it in the future for their own advocacy, she'd be happy to turn it over to them.
