A twist of fate

The memorial service: June 4, 2006

On June 4, a memorial service was held for Laura Van Ryn.

Don Van Ryn: It was a powerful service and it was a good time for sharing from Laura’s friends and others. We talked about Laura and what kind of a person she was. Compassionate. Always thinking of the interests of others over herself.

Lisa Van Ryn: Even people that knew her before felt like they got to know her better.

But a question hovered over them all.

Aryn: Many of you today are probably wondering how a man could date a girl and love a girl for three years, and not know that it was her.

How could the people who knew Laura best, her own family and her closest friends, mistake another woman for her? Laura's longtime boyfriend, Aryn:

Aryn: I saw her hands, her feet, her complexion, and I couldn't believe that it wasn't her. Even to this day, it's amazing to me that out of how much time we have spent together, that I just didn't know. And there's been many times in these last couple days where I’ve been mad at God. And how he could allow this to happen to me.

Matt Lauer: Let's just try and handle the one question that so many viewers are going to ask once and for all. They're going to say, "They were right up against the bed 24 hours a day. There were these little moments of eye color and teeth and the belly button." And they're going to say, "how could this have gone on so long?" How do you explain it to people?

Don Van Ryn: Well, first I say you're right. It's an amazing thing, isn't it? How could it have gone on so long? But as we've tried to describe, you have to try and put yourself in our shoes at the time.

Start with the crash itself: total chaos. Somehow, the two women's purses -- and photo identifications -- were switched at the scene. Then the survivor was rushed to the hospital.

The coroner later acknowledged he'd done no scientific tests to confirm the identities of the dead; state law at the time did not require any. And remember: no member of Whitney’s family ever asked to see her body.

Matt Lauer: Did anybody ask anyone at the hospital how the body was identified?

Newell Cerak: No.

Colleen Cerak: No.

Newell Cerak: No, we didn't. We had just assumed that that the identifications had been made.

Colleen Cerak: I mean why would you at that point.

Newell Cerak: Why we didn't question anything at that point.

But what about Laura’s family? It's true that Whitney and Laura shared a superficial resemblance. Both were young, blonde, attractive. But there were key differences, too. The teeth, the eyes, the piercing. And Whitney is about four inches taller than Laura. How could they not see those differences?

Don Van Ryn: It just goes back to what we were told on the way down. That our daughter had been, you know, in a bad accident. Expect to see her altered. And we walked in, we saw that. And with the tubes hanging out. And we -- she looked like Laura. And there were a lot of similarities, definitely. As I look at the two now, no, I don't think she looks like Laura. But again, you have to realize too that at least 100 other people, other friends were in that room and saw her.

Lisa Van Ryn: Also, you have to consider our emotional state as -- you know, you're just hydroplaning through this.

Here's a picture that's never been seen before: a photo of Whitney taken about 10 days after the crash, while she was still in a coma, while she was still thought to be Laura.

Ask yourself, without the benefit of hindsight, could you identify the patient? With her brain injury, she went for days without opening her eyes. She had no facial expressions. She wasn't speaking.

Matt Lauer: And so there were no trademark smiles.

Lisa Van Ryn: Right.

Don Van Ryn: Right.

Matt Lauer: There wasn't that trademark expression in the cheeks and in the eyes. She was a little bit of a blank slate at that--

Don Van Ryn: Absolutely.

Matt Lauer: Is that perhaps it? That when people face a trauma like this and a world turned upside down that in some ways you see what you're told to see and believe what you hope to believe?

Don Van Ryn: It's quite possible. And all our energy was focused on making her well. Healing her. And it became her identity. We talk about it's like you say, it --

Lisa Van Ryn: Her altered state became her identity.

Don Van Ryn: Yeah. And you say, "well, it's just--" None of these things we were looking for. I mean we weren't looking to establish the fact that this wasn't our daughter.

Lisa Van Ryn: Viewers are all saying, "Why didn't you notice the teeth or the shoes or the whatever?" It's like those are pieces to a puzzle that we didn't even know existed.

Susie Van Ryn: We didn't know there was a puzzle.

Lisa Van Ryn: We didn't know we were supposed to be putting together a puzzle.

It was a puzzle they didn't create and didn't know to look for. A puzzle that took five weeks to solve.

Matt Lauer: Do you even understand how this mistake could have happened? And lasted for five weeks?

Mr. Cerak: No, I don't think I totally understand how it could happen. I mean, we look back and we can see that could have been picked up on, or we could have picked up on that, but when you're in that moment, that doesn't even occur to you. We all chose the different paths that we chose. Not to look at the body and, you know, they chose to believe what was told them. And we respect that. And we're just so thankful for what they did for Whitney.

Matt Lauer: They also feel a little guilty about by not recognizing that it was Whitney and not their daughter, that they brought so much extra suffering on you unnecessarily.

Mr. Cerak: You know, those five weeks were hard. They were very, very hard. But they should feel no guilt for that whatsoever. I know that they loved her every bit as much as they would have their own daughter. And that, in itself, was just huge.

But how did all the confusion of those five weeks affect a young woman with a brain injury -- who was struggling to regain her memory and identity?

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