A new look at the mystery of Jodi Huisentruit, the TV anchor now 30 years missing

Caroline Lowe keeps broadcaster Jodi Huisentruit close to the heart — especially in June. Every day of the month, she wears a necklace that says, “6/27/95,” the date the TV anchor raised in Long Prairie, Minn., went missing.

“People ask me, ‘Why Jodi?’ Because she was one of our own, a Minnesota journalist on the same track so many of us were on,” the WCCO alum said last week. “I feel this sense of family. It is very personal.”

Lowe — a former WCCO-TV reporter who will be inducted into the Minnesota Broadcasters Hall of Fame in September — is one of several high-profile journalists still investigating the case in which the 27-year-old broadcaster disappeared on her way to work at the CBS affiliate in Mason City, Iowa.

Hulu just premiered “Her Last Broadcast: The Abduction of Jodi Huisentruit,” a docuseries from ABC News Studios and Committee Films, an Eden Prairie-based production company that specializes in true crime, one of the hottest genres in the streaming world.

“There is an inherent sense of mystery in stories like this one,” said Committee Films senior vice president Maria Awes, who produced all three episodes. “Viewers can be armchair detectives who see the clues and find the missing links. They’ve got a different monumental weight to them than those in the scripted landscape.”

The Huisentruit story resonates strongly with Awes. She remembers studying the vanishing in her journalism class at the University of St. Thomas. She worked on a previous look at the case, 2022’s “Gone at Dawn,” which also was part of the “20/20″ franchise.

Her long association with law enforcement contributed to one of the most fascinating aspects of the three-part series, a chance to be embedded with Mason City officers as they interviewed a suspect and looked for remains in Winsted, Minn. Neither step led to a major development, but the footage gives viewers a real-life version of what they see on “Law & Order.”

“We’re living in a time when a lot of communication is through emails and phone calls. But I’m a huge proponent of face-to-face relationships,” Awes said while explaining how she secured the rare level of access. “You build that level of trust.”

Huisentruit, who was 27 when she disappeared, was a graduate of St. Cloud State University and an anchor at KIMT in Mason City, Iowa, when she didn’t show up to work on June 27, 1995. She is believed to have been abducted, though her body has never been found. At least four people have been identified as possible suspects over the years, but there have been no arrests or major developments. Law enforcement has not recently revealed any new leads or new evidence.

Despite a number of dead ends, many journalists haven’t given up.

Awes’ obsession with Huisentruit’s disappearance doesn’t stop when she leaves the office. Her husband, Andy Awes, is both the series’ director and the founder of Committee.

“We try avoid talking shop all the time, but it’s part of who we are. We’re immersed in it,” she said. “We try not to talk about it at dinner, but inevitably there’s some leftover conversation.”

The Hulu series includes work done by Lowe during her time as an investigative reporter at WCCO. Even though she moved to California in 2011, she has stayed on the case, joining the team at findjodi.com, a website that keeps the public updated and urges people to come forward with tips.

Lowe recently learned how to make a TikTok video so she could reach a younger audience. Last month, she organized the annual gathering in Mason City on the anniversary of Huisentruit’s abduction, with speeches in front of the KIMT station.

Lowe was so emotional she wore sunglasses so no one could see the tears.

As part of the 30th anniversary, she’s been interviewed by major news outlets like CNN and NewsNation. After a recent on-air chat with MPR’s Cathy Wurzer, she hung up and sobbed.

“Working on it so much does sound unhealthy,” said Lowe, taking a short break from a vacation last week in Charleston, where she was trying to decompress from the media blitz. “But I’m driven to do what I can.”

Lowe said she is heartened by the knowledge that the murder of 11-year-old Jacob Wetterling, another story she worked on during her time in the Twin Cities market, was solved in 2015 after 27 years.

“My grandson asked me a few years ago, ‘When are you going to stop doing this?’” Lowe said. “His sister jumped in and said, ‘Never.’ I agree. I don’t see any off-ramp until Jodi comes home.“