'It's not her anymore': They took her daughter to protect her. The person she found wasn't the same.
Editor's note: Laurence Reisman has followed this case since March 2022, facing numerous roadblocks for public records and interviews in the process. This is the third in a series. Catch up on Part 1 and Part 2 here.
Almost two years after her mentally disabled daughter was taken from her amid a federal investigation, Supee Spindler had an emotional reunion via Zoom with Nisarat “Nungning” Jittasonthi.
“I am so happy I could cry!” Jittasonthi, 49, told her mother Oct. 21, 2022, according to a translation of the meeting by TransPerfect, provided to TCPalm by attorneys for Spindler, 71.
“You are crying for joy that you can talk to me?” Spindler asked, as the two began to weep.
“Yes, that I can talk to you, Mom.”
“Crying? Now, I am crying. I want to see you, Nungning. I miss you, Nungning. I miss you every day.”
The Zoom call came 20 months after Vero Beach police and federal agents showed up at the door of Spindler’s 12-year-old therapeutic massage and facial business in February 2021. Jittasonthi was taken to a Catholic Charities shelter in Palm Beach County.
A woman Spindler described as a disgruntled ex-employee had reported to police Jittasonthi, a coworker, might be a victim of human trafficking. After all, Spindler kept the woman’s ID and Jittasonthi supposedly made claims about her mother’s treatment in handwritten letters the ex-worker gave authorities.
Zoom reunion emotional
There was no mention Jittasonthi was Spindler’s daughter, that her mother took care of her or she had the mental capacity of a third-grader (according to medical records). As for the letters, neither Vero Beach police nor Homeland Security Investigations has released them to TCPalm.
The original story: No charges, feds mum: Court stymies Vero Beach woman's efforts to see daughter
No charges were ever filed. Records provided by Spindler's attorneys show Homeland Security Investigations closed its case in September 2021, while the Florida Department of Children and Families investigation closed a probe even earlier.
It was the second time DCF had decided Jittasonthi was not endangered. In October 2020, Indian River County sheriff’s deputies called DCF after finding Jittasonthi outside the family home with a bag packed, reportedly hoping to go back to Thailand following an apparent argument with her mother.
But after Jittasonthi was taken by authorities in February 2021, Spindler spent tens of thousands of dollars on private investigators and attorneys trying to find her daughter, having last conversed with her on a monitored phone that June.
The Zoom call on October, 21, 2022, shed light on their relationship.
“I want to be with you, Mom,” Jittasonthi told her mother, the first of more than 30 similar affirmative claims in the 70-minute call monitored by lawyers and case workers.
“You want to be with me?”
“Yes,” Jittasonthi replied, apparently in a room at a Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking shelter in Los Angeles. Catholic Charities records released by Spindler's attorneys show she’d been moved there in November 2021.
'I’ve never seen my mother like that.'
What Spindler saw on Zoom was heartbreaking. So much so, her younger daughter, Supaporn "Poi" Naknukool, 41, a Ph.D biochemist, will never forget the call she received from her mother after the Zoom meeting.
“ 'We lost her ... it’s not her anymore,' " Naknukool recently recalled her sobbing mother saying. "I’ve never seen my mother like that.”
Jittasonthi’s arm and face shook. She had a runny nose and no way to clean it. Later, Jittasonthi got up and had mobility issues.
“Everyone is worried about you, Nungning. Are you sick?” Spindler asked.
“I am a little unwell.”
“What’s wrong with you?” her mother asked.
“I miss you, Mom.”
“Oh, my God. Look at my daughter. Why she look like that?” Spindler asked.
No one explained, though Jittasonthi said she took pharmaceuticals and vitamins as instructed by her caretakers, none of whom returned email requests for comment. Spindler told her daughter to thank anyone who helped her, just as she had been taught.
Spindler reminded her daughter to make sure she cleaned herself and her room, which she shared with another woman, lest germs get her sick.
The mother and daughter talked about some of Jittasonthi’s favorite things:
Dolls of Doraemon (robotic cat from a Japanese TV series), a zebra, giraffe and cat; yarn; books; certain clothes, including a shirt with a broken zipper her mom had fixed at a tailor.
Hoping to plan trip to LAX
“And the outfit you like to wear around Christmas … I have it ready for you, Nungning. … And the Hello Kitty you drew for me, I still have it.”
Spindler asked her daughter about friends and activities in Los Angeles. Jittasonthi said she had a female Thai friend who had been sheltered for 20 years. Jittasonthi liked speaking with her because she could translate.
But about the only thing they did was eat in the cafeteria.
“Absolutely nothing,” Jittasonthi said, explaining what she did. “I don’t even have a broom ... to sweep.”
Spindler asked her daughter what she wanted when she came home.
“I would like a set of clothes.”
“What color?” Spindler asked.
“I would like yellow.”
The two were slated for another call the following week, but it never was confirmed by Nicole Avila, a Florida Rural Legal services attorney who said she represented Jittasonthi.
It took until Nov. 4 for Spindler attorney Joni Mazzola to get word she and Spindler would pick up Jittasonthi at 12:30 p.m. Nov. 8, 2022, at the Los Angeles Airport Hilton. They’d have a wheelchair ready, just in case.
It was a pleasant reunion, but not like one you’d see on Hallmark TV.
Challenges just beginning
Mazzola said Jittasonthi’s caretakers were 45 minutes late and did not have all her things packed for a flight, so some ― like the Doraemon and her knitting needles ― were left behind.
Jittasonthi needed the wheelchair, Mazzola said, and she did not look well.
"She was like crippled getting out of van," Spindler told me recently. "I thought with the Thai community (in Los Angeles), she might be OK, but … I expected her to be doing activities with other Thai people."
Mazzola wasn’t given Jittasonthi’s passport, which authorities had taken in 2021. With their flight home nearing, Mazzola said she explained the situation to a Transportation Security Administration supervisor, showing her Florida Bar card and a certified copy of Circuit Judge Robert Meadows’ order, citing Spindler as her daughter’s guardian. Jittasonthi was allowed through security.
Back in Florida, Mazzola said she counseled Spindler to have a medical professional look at Jittasonthi. Spindler called one of her clients, Chris Maguire, an emergency room physician.
"She was markedly in bad shape," said Maguire, who remembered the outgoing, friendly Jittasonthi from making beds and doing laundry at Spindler's business. Now she was non-responsive, slow and drooling.
"She looked really sedated," Maguire said, adding she'd been sent home from California with an array of prescription drugs. "I encouraged her to go to the hospital."
Spindler said Jittasonthi had a fever and spent 10 days at HCA Florida Lawnwood Hospital in Fort Pierce and 10 more in a rehabilitation facility.
Even when Jittasonthi got home, she needed a friend's help to take a shower and get into bed, Spindler said.
But Spindler’s challenges were just beginning.
NEXT: A rough 2023 leads to things to be thankful for.
This column reflects the opinion of Laurence Reisman. Contact him via email at larry.reisman@tcpalm.com, phone at 772-978-2223, Facebook.com/larryreisman or Twitter @LaurenceReisman.
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This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: Florida mom, daughter reunite in Los Angeles after two-year ordeal
