Unsolved Mysteries volume 3 recap guide: Episodes 1-9 explained

Unsolved Mysteries season 3 episode 9 recap: “Abducted by a Parent”

The final episode of Unsolved Mysteries season 3 tells two different stories of children abducted by one of their own parents. Through interviews with the parents looking for their kids, we learn how failed marriages with people they thought they could trust led to such awful situations.

In the first part of the episode, we meet Rebecca Downey, a woman whose two children Amina and Belel were stolen from her by their father in 2014. Rebecca recounts how she first met her now ex-husband Ahmed Kandil, and how they had a great relationship at the start. They decided to get married and have kids while Rebecca was in medical school.

Ahmed worked in finance and lost his job during the recession, with Rebecca and a family friend saying in the episode that he completely changed after that. He was no longer happy and he turned heavily to his religion. Rebecca notes his views became more “conservative.” Eventually, Rebecca and Ahmed split up in 2013. The two co-parented amicably until one weekend when Ahmed claimed he was taking the kids to Canada for a few days.

When Rebecca stopped hearing from him, she was understandably alarmed as she contacted the kids’ schools, Ahmed’s dad in Egypt, and even sent her friend to Ahmed’s house to see if he was there. But what her friend found was extremely disturbing. His house had been cleared out.

Rebecca got the FBI involved and they discovered that Ahmed never took the kids to Canada, and instead they flew to Turkey. They also saw by going through Ahmed’s recent purchases that he had recently taken a survivalist course, visited a shooting range, and bought camping equipment and clothing.

Desperate for answers, Rebecca also hired multiple private investigators to help find Amina and Belel, and she found out that Amina’s iPad was located in Hatay, Turkey. As Rebecca mentions in the episode, Hatay is right next to the border of Syria, a country that’s been at war for years. She also received an email she believed was from Ahmed, which said the children were safe and living on a farm. She was able to uncover an email address from the message, which Rebecca says was a known address of Ahmed’s. The IP address was then traced to an internet cafe in Hatay.

Did Rebecca Downey ever find her kids, Amina and Belel?

Unfortunately, that’s where Rebecca hit a dead end. She speculated that the children could be living in Egypt, as she knows Ahmed’s family owns a farm there. But with the laws being different out of the United States, Rebecca’s been urged not to travel there to try and find the children. It could prove too dangerous for her.

Since the abduction of Anima and Belel, Rebecca has started a website and writes letters to her kids every day. She doesn’t give up hope that one day she will find them. Their whereabouts are still unknown at the point of this writing, sadly.

The second part of this Unsolved Mysteries episode follows a dad named Abdul Khan, whose son Aziz was abducted in 2017 by his mother, Rabia Khalid. Abdul and Rabia were happily married and welcomed their son into the world in 2010, but unfortunately, their relationship did not make it. According to Abdul, Rabia had trouble getting along with her in-laws and the two began arguing a lot. By 2014, they decided to separate, but Rabia made it seem like she wanted to work on their marriage.

Abdul and his family were then shocked when Rabia suddenly served him with divorce papers. The two co-parented while Abdul lived in New Orleans and Rabia lived in Atlanta, but things got more and more complicated as Rabia would try to keep Aziz from his dad. Abdul eventually went to court after the divorce was finalized and was awarded sole custody of Aziz. But this did not sit well with Rabia. She then accused Abdul and his family of abuse, something the court took very seriously.

During their custody battle, it was revealed that Rabia had remarried, to a man named Elliot Bourgeois. Elliot attended court dates with Rabia.

Abdul was not able to see his son while the allegations were being investigated, but eventually, the court determined that Rabia’s claims were baseless and Abdul was to have custody again. He was set to meet Rabia and Aziz at the courthouse in November 2017, but they never showed up. As Abdul started to look for answers, he found out that Aziz hadn’t been to school, and Rabia and Elliot’s social media accounts were disabled.

Did Abdul Khan ever find his son, Aziz?

Sadly, police haven’t been able to locate Rabia, Elliot, or Aziz to this day. The Unsolved Mysteries episode ends with Abdul and his family still looking for Aziz, and they say they aren’t going to stop until they find him.

The hope is that as people watch this new episode of Unsolved Mysteries volume 3, people will come out with information they know about Rebecca Downey and Abdul Khan’s kids. It’s truly a shame what they’ve gone through.

The first six episodes of Unsolved Mysteries volume 3 are now streaming on Netflix.