Stirling Teen Disappears, Cops Find This | Carly Ryan | True Crime Documentary 2024

Carly Ryan, from Stirling, South Australia, fell head-over-heels for her boyfriend, Brandon Kane. Investigators say that Brandon had a few dark secrets that Carly was blissfully unaware of. Detectives would learn that things would take a dark turn when Carly failed to return home from a night out with friends.

She’d been acting somewhat strange in the moments before leaving that day, repeatedly asking her mother for hugs. It seems almost like she knew something was wrong, but she was powerless to stop it. Carly’s mother certainly felt that something was a bit off that evening, but she could’ve never imagined just how terrifying things were about to become. Well… its a scary mystery.

My name is Ty Notts and I’m a freelance cold case detective who investigates unsolved mysteries, true crime recaps, and unexplained crimes. If you’re looking for interesting detective stories, look no further. Here on True Crime Stories, I cover true crime cases and true scary stories you’ve never heard of. I also post new true crime documentaries each week, so follow for more!

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Backdrop created by Shreetej (Insta: @tezra3d)

Chapters:
00:00 Beginning
06:22 Brandon Kane
08:51 The Birthday Party
12:23 The Crime
14:04 To Catch a Predator

#coldcase #truecrimestories #crimestories #truecrimestories #scarystories #scarymysteries #investigation #crimedocumentary #missingperson

It was 2007 when Carly Ryan fell head-over-heels  for her boyfriend, Brandon Kane. Investigators say   that the two had everything in common, but Brandon  had a few dark secrets that Carly was blissfully   unaware of. Detectives would learn that Carly  and Brandon had been dating for several months  

Leading up to the crime, and everything was going  well for the two. But one day in February of 2007,   things would take a dark turn when Carly failed  to return home from a night out with friends. She’d been acting somewhat strange in  the moments before leaving that day,  

Repeatedly asking her mother for hugs. It  seems almost like she knew something was wrong,   but she was powerless to stop it. Carly’s mother  certainly felt that something was a bit off that   evening, but she could’ve never imagined just  how terrifying things were about to become. [intro]

Carly Ryan was born in January of 1992 in  Stirling, South Australia. She was raised by   her mother, Sonya, for most of her childhood,  but there’s never been any mention of what   happened to her father, so I suppose it can be  assumed that he was simply out of the picture.  

The thing about Carly is that she was growing  up in the midst of a social media hurricane.   By the time she was a teenager, it seemed like  there was a new social media platform coming out  

Every other day of the week – and this was long  before Facebook was the goliath that it is today. Most of this case takes place back in 2006 and  2007, so we’re talking about the days of MySpace,   Xanga, Tumblr, and the countless online instant  messengers that were around. It was an incredibly  

Interesting time to be on the internet, but  it was also a remarkably dangerous time,   because many of the safeguards that are in  place today simply didn’t exist back then. Considering Carly was just a teenager  around this time, her mother, Sonya,  

Was pretty critical with what Carly got up to  online. Carly and Sonya were remarkably close,   meaning Sonya knew pretty much every detail of  Carly’s life. She’d often walk by the computer   and take a peek at what Carly was doing, but  knowing that her daughter was a smart girl,  

She trusted that Carly was being safe  and cautious. Sonya says that she feels   like she knew about everything going on in  Carly’s life. She knew all of her friends,   kept tabs on what was going on at school, and was  an ever-present force in all that Carly did – not  

In a helicopter-parent kind of way, but in a  pretty healthy mother-daughter relationship   way. You’ve got to remember, it was just the two  of them, so they were understandably super close. But the main issue here is that, at this  point in history, the internet was… wild,  

To put it lightly. Carly was known to spend a  lot of time on a website called ratemybody.com.   For those of you who aren’t familiar with this  site, well, it’s pretty much exactly what you   would think. People post photos of themselves  and anonymous users rate that person’s body.

The big problem with this website is  that, as we’ve already established,   there were virtually no safeguards in place. The  website prided itself on anonymity, and that means   there was no way of knowing if the images you  were looking at even belonged to the person who  

Uploaded them. Worse yet, considering this website  was often visited by teenagers… Well, I think you   get the picture I’m painting here. This was not a  safe website, and it was a major hotspot for older   men who had some rather nefarious intentions.  Thankfully, this website has since been shut down.

Carly has often been described as a “scene  girl”. This is a bit of a vague term that   most often refers to teens or young adults  who are super interested in the gothic,   punk lifestyle. These would’ve been the kids  listening to bands such as Black Veil Brides,  

Asking Alexandria, Escape the Fate, all while  reading Twilight or something similar. Wearing   all black from head to toe, black hoodies, black  headphones, so on and so forth. And don’t think   I’m saying this in a judgey or joke kind of way –  I was one of those kids too. Heck, I still listen  

To all those bands. Dying Is Your Latest Fashion  is one of the greatest punk albums of all time. For Carly, this group of people and this  lifestyle is what gave her a sense of purpose,   a sense of belonging. She was known for being  pretty active on the website vampirefreaks.com,  

Which was another goth or emo  website and store. But most of all,   she would spend hours upon hours on  MySpace. Her profile was pretty much   everything you’d imagine it to be. It was  full of gothic selfies, heaps of makeup,  

Links to all of her favorite online forums, quotes  from her favorite books – typical MySpace stuff. By sharing her interest in this genre of  entertainment, Carly was able to make dozens   of online friends. But there was one friend in  particular who really caught Carly’s interest.  

An 18-year-old named Brandon Kane. Brandon  was a young musician who was born in Texas,   but had recently moved to Brisbane, Australia  – the total opposite side of the country from   Carly. The two immediately became friends as  soon as they met. They liked all the same bands,  

Had all the same interests, it was  almost like they were meant to be. Before too long, their friendship grew into  something more. Carly began to share stories   of her new online friend with her real life  friends. It wasn’t too long after this that  

Carly stopped referring to him as simply a friend,  as he was now considered her boyfriend. All of   Carly’s closest friends knew about Brandon,  and Sonya knew about him too. It seems that,   in the early days of their relationship,  Sonya was happy that her daughter had met  

Someone that she could be so open with.  Even though Brandon was a few years older,   Sonya didn’t find this too terribly  concerning. She mentioned that she   would look over Carly’s shoulder from time to  time to see what the two were chatting about,  

But she never noticed anything suspicious  or anything that concerned her in any way. Before long, the two started video chatting  with one another and, by all means,   Brandon appeared to be the guy he claimed to be.  Carly couldn’t have been happier. Even though her  

Boyfriend lived over 20 hours away, she was just  ecstatic to have someone she could be so close   with. But it didn’t take long before things  started to get… well, a little bit unusual. Brandon Kane Brandon was quickly becoming the main focus  of Carly’s life. Whatever the two were up to,  

The other person was immediately informed about it  – they shared everything with one another. What I   found particularly fascinating is that, as we all  know, most teenage relationships don’t last too   terribly long, especially online relationships.  But Carly and Brandon managed to keep their  

Relationship going for more than 18 months  even though they’d never even met in person. After they’d been chatting for about a year or so,  Brandon wanted to introduce Carly to his father,   Shane, and he did this over a video call. As time  rolled on, Carly started talking about Shane more  

And more frequently. In fact, it didn’t  take long before Carly was talking about   Shane just as much as she was talking about  Brandon. This is when Sonya started to get   a little bit concerned. She asked Carly why  she suddenly had such an interest in Shane,  

And she explained that Brandon and Shane were  incredibly close – much like Sonya and Carly were. Sonya reminded Carly to be careful, and Carly  made it very clear that if anything started   to get weird or uncomfortable, she’d  tell her mother right away. For Sonya,  

This was enough to calm her fears,  so she dropped it and let it be. Sonya would later learn that Shane had a job as a  security guard, and this job caused him to travel   for work events every so often. In February of  2007, he was traveling across Australia for one of  

These events, and on his way home to Brisbane, he  offered to stop by Carly and Sonya’s home to drop   off a few birthday gifts that he and Brandon  had purchased for Carly the previous month. At first, Sonya thought this was a little  bit strange. But when Shane showed up at the  

Family’s home, he was wearing his security guard  outfit, so his story seemed to check out. Shane   seemed to be exactly the man he claimed to be. He  was clean cut, professional, and nothing seemed   unusual about him. In fact, Carly and Sonya  felt so safe around him that they offered to  

Let him spend the night at their home, inviting  him to Carly’s birthday party the following day. But while Shane was in town, he offered to  take Carly shopping. Now this, in my book, is   definitely a bit strange. What would a 50-year-old  man be doing taking a teenage girl shopping?  

Even if he was the father of her boyfriend, this  seems a bit strange, considering the two had only   just met, and there’s been no indication that  Carly’s mother was present during their trip.   But the following day, at Carly’s birthday party,  that’s when things really started to get bizarre. The Birthday Party

When Shane showed up at Carly’s birthday  party, it was immediately clear that   something strange was happening. When Carly’s  friends and family members started showing up,   Shane started to get visibly uncomfortable.  There wasn’t any particular moment that   you could point to and say, “See that? That’s  weird.” But Sonya started to notice that Shane,  

For lack of a better word,  seemed possessive over Carly. It seemed almost as if Shane and Carly  were glued at the hip. He didn’t let her   wander off too terribly far, and he hung  around Carly throughout the entire party,  

Rarely ever speaking to anyone other than  her for more than a few simple sentences.   But the following morning, that’s when  things really started to get weird. As Sonya passed by Carly’s bedroom, she  noticed that Shane and Carly were lying  

On Carly’s bed. In one report, it was claimed  that Shane was actually lying on top of Carly,   and Carly was clearly uncomfortable.  Sonya immediately sprang into action   and told Shane that he needed to leave  immediately. It doesn’t seem like he put  

Up too much of a fight either – he knew he’d  been caught. He grabbed his things and left. As soon as he was gone, Carly revealed that  he’d made a few passes at her, but that she had  

Repeatedly rejected his advances, insisting that  she was in love with his son, not him. Carly then   told her mother about the birthday presents that  Shane had shown up with. Now, because of YouTube’s   terms of service, I can’t really explain the full  extent of these gifts. But let me just say, one of  

Them was an… outfit, that no 50-year-old man had  any business gifting to the girlfriend of his son. This was the moment that Sonya truly  understood what was happening here. She   made all the right moves in the coming days,  taking away Carly’s access to social media,  

Banning her from using her cell phone, keeping  a much closer eye on her online activity,   and calling Shane and telling him that he  was never allowed to speak to her daughter   again or she’d report him to the police.  Mind you, this may all sound a bit harsh,  

But this wasn’t done as a way to punish Carly in  any way – this was all done in a bid to keep Carly   safe – and based on Sonya’s statements since  then, it seems that she likely did a good job  

Explaining this to Carly. It’s awful that Carly  lost so many of her freedoms because of this guy,   but when it comes to the safety of your child,  all bets are off. You do what you have to do.

But the problem is that, well, we’ve all been  teenagers at some point. We all know that,   regardless of what your parents do, regardless of  what they tell you, if you want to do something,   you’ll find a way to do it, and Carly wasn’t  willing to let Brandon go. She admitted that what  

Happened with Shane was pretty insane, but Brandon  wasn’t to blame. No sooner than her mother forbade   her from speaking with Brandon, Carly was right  back up to her old antics, speaking to Brandon   every chance she could get. Only this time, she  was keeping it a secret. Her mother had no idea.

A few weeks passed by and it was February 19th,  2007 when Carly told her mother that she was going   to be spending the night out with a group of her  friends. She got dressed up in her best outfit,  

Then headed for the front door. But strangely,  Sonya says that, it was at this moment,   that Carly’s behavior began to change. She  turned to her mother and asked her for a hug,   then another, then another, and another. It  was almost as if she was afraid to leave. Her  

Demeanor had changed without any rhyme or  reason. Sonya didn’t really know what this   was all about, but what kind of mother  would turn away hugs from her daughter? Carly’s last words to her mother  before she left were simply,   “Love you, mom.” The door closed,  and Carly was never seen again. The Crime

Carly never returned home from her outing with  her friends that evening. When she still hadn’t   shown up by the following morning, Sonya  knew something had gone terribly wrong,   and that’s when she called the police  to report her daughter missing – every  

Parents worst nightmare. But for Sonya, her  nightmare was about to get far, far worse. Sonya would be subjected to something that  no parent should ever have to face. As she   was pacing around the home, pleading  for some sort of news about her doctor,  

She heard a knock at the door,  followed by two police officers   with sullen expressions. As we all  know, this never means anything good. Carly had been found, but not the way her  mother had hoped. Investigators revealed that,   early that morning, detectives had come across  a victim who’d been floating in Horseshoe Bay.  

The victim was identified as Carly Ryan. When  she was taken in for further forensic analysis,   it was determined that Carly had endured at  least 19 injuries before she lost her life,   each of which was more haunting,  heinous and heartbreaking than the last.

Security cameras and witness reports would  soon reveal that Carly was last seen on the   beach in the Horseshoe Bay area at around  9:30 the previous evening. She was in the   company of what appeared to be two men, but  it would later come to light that this had  

Been one man and a teenage boy. They had  arrived in the area in a blue vehicle,   and it was this vehicle description that  was used to track them down later on. As it would turn out, the two males who  were seen in the CCTV security footage  

Were none other than Shane and Brandon…  except, that’s not entirely true. See,   that’s because Shane and  Brandon… they didn’t exist. …To Catch a Predator 11 days after Carly was discovered  in Horseshoe Bay, police closed in on   Garry Francis Newman as well as his teenage  son. His teenage son has never been named,  

Due to laws in Australia that prevent the  names of young offenders from being revealed.   It would quickly become clear that Garry was,  in fact, both Shane and Brandon. He’d created   an alter-ego online to lure teenage girls  and cause them to fall in love with him,  

Faking interest in everything they loved and  stalking them both online and in the real world. What makes this situation so much worse  is that Garry had either convinced or   forced his teenage son to play a part in  the scheme as well. Considering there’s  

Virtually zero information available  about Garry’s son, we don’t know if he   was a willing accomplice or if he was just  as much a victim as Carly was. Basically,   Garry was the one who was chatting with Carly for  more than a year online. But anytime he needed  

To schedule a video call with Carly, he would  ask his son to step in to make things seem more   realistic. All the photos that had been  shared between the two were also of his son. When Shane – of Garry – was forced  to leave Carly’s home after being  

Caught lying in her bed, he was  understandably upset. After all,   he’d been concocting this plan for more than  a year and a half, and in the blink of an eye,   it was all over. But he couldn’t let this be  the end. He needed to see Carly one final time,  

And this time, he would bring his  teenage son along to help finish the job. Carly was lured out of her home that  evening under the promise of finally   being able to meet her online boyfriend  in person for the first time. She lied  

To her mother and explained that  she’d be going out with friends,   but in reality, she was due to hang out with  her boyfriend… or so she thought. The thing is,   Carly knew that something was fishy about this  situation. She had seen all the red flags,  

Her mother had warned her about both Shane and  Brandon, but she chose to risk it all anyway. We know that Carly knew about the potential  dangers because of how apprehensive she   was to leave her home that evening. Her  mother knew something was a bit off too,  

But considering Carly lied about her intentions  that evening, there was little her mother could   do – she was blissfully unaware of the level of  danger her daughter was about to put herself in. Now don’t think for one second  that I’m blaming this on Carly,  

She was never anything more than a victim  of this awful, heartless monster. I merely   bring up the fact that she ignored  all of the obvious signs of danger,   as a warning to parents – or teenagers – that,  when your gut tells you something is unsafe,  

It’s probably because it’s unsafe. If you smell  smoke, there’s probably a fire. We’ve been given   the gift of gut-feelings for a reason, and  you should pretty much always trust them. But, if you could imagine, this story is about  to get a whole lot worse. If you remember,  

It was nearly two weeks after Carly was found  in Horseshoe Bay that Garry’s home was finally   raided by the police. When detectives showed up  at his home, Garry was actually in the middle   of chatting up another teenage girl online.  When his home was searched and investigators  

Combed through every square inch of the place,  they found a notebook that had documented at   least 200 different aliases that Garry had  been using online. From what I can tell,   he used this notebook to help keep his stories  straight so that his victims wouldn’t see right  

Through his charade. Brandon and Shane had  been just two of his names – less than 1% of   his total list of characters. In this notebook,  investigators found names, ages, occupations,   interests, everything that related to each and  every one of these characters he had created.

If you consider that Garry used 2  aliases when speaking with Carly,   that means that he could’ve  had another 100 victims,   assuming he pulled the whole father and  son card for each one of them. In reality,   this number of victims could be substantially  higher – there’s just no way to know for sure.

This notebook was also a gold mine  for investigators because it even   documented usernames and passwords  for each of his fake online profiles,   giving them every last piece of evidence  they needed to get this man behind bars. But we have to remember that… putting someone  behind bars does little to help calm the pain  

Of the family who are now left with one less  person at the dinner table each night. Worse yet,   in Sonya’s case, she’s now left  with no one at her dinner table   each night. Sonya’s world ended the day  that she lost her daughter. Her purpose,  

Her goals, her ambitions, they’re  gone, and she can never get them back. Thankfully, Garry was sentenced  to life in prison. Unfortunately,   he will still be eligible for parole after  29 years, but considering he was 50 when  

This crime took place, the man will likely be  80 before he ever has the slightest chance of   seeing natural sunlight again – though we can  all hope that this day never comes for Garry. In the wake of Garry’s sentencing, Garry’s  ex-wife came out and explained why the two  

Had gotten divorced many years before  this. She explained that Garry had been   shockingly aggressive toward her, assaulting  her multiple times, forcing her against her   will on many occasions. When he then turned  his attention to his own teenage daughter,  

That’s when she knew that she needed to get  herself and their three children out of there. Unfortunately, this wasn’t even a wake up  call for Garry. He would later adopt a son   of his own – the one he would use in his  online schemes – and he simply repeated  

The cycle. After all was said and done,  Garry’s son was cleared of all charges,   which pretty much secures the idea that his son  was likely just as much of a victim as Carly was. In the aftermath of such a tragedy, Sonya  felt that she needed to do something,  

Anything to help parents whose children may end  up in similar situations. This led her to form   the Carly Ryan Foundation, a foundation that  offers certified online safety programs and   conducts regular seminars to help educate children  and parents about the dangers of online predators.

If this wasn’t enough, Sonya also helped  to establish Carly’s law – an Australian   law that allows prosecutors to both charge  and convict online predators before they   ever lay a hand on a child. They can do this by  establishing intent based on chat logs, as well  

As convict an adult who misrepresents their age to  a minor. This law has already saved so many lives,   and Sonya was the driving force behind this  law every step of the way. If not for her,   there’s no telling how many other children  may have ended up just like Carly.

If you are a parent, or even if you’re  a teenager, I would strongly urge you to   visit carlyryanfoundation.com to better understand  everything that the foundation has to offer. The   resources page has heaps of valuable information  that’s been updated for modern times to help  

Keep kids safe on more modern platforms,  such as Roblox, Fortnite, and the various   other online social media or gaming platforms  that are predominantly aimed towards children. There’s nothing that any of us can do to bring  Carly back, but if Sonya has it her way, every  

Child across the globe will become better educated  about internet safety so that stories like this,   will one day, be a thing of the past. No one  should ever have to go through what Carly  

And Sonya dealt with – and it’s our job – you  and me – it’s our job to keep these kids safe. — Thank you guys for tuning into another episode  of True Crime Stories. If you enjoyed this video,   check out this other interesting case I  covered – and don’t forget to subscribe.  

It’s totally free and keeps you up to  date with all my future videos. You can   also click that ‘JOIN’ button below to  support the channel and see new videos   long before everyone else does. But my name is Ty  Notts, and I’ll catch you guys in the next one.