If you’re anything like us, you consumed the three-part Netflix documentary American Nightmare about the Denise Huskins case in one sitting and were left reeling by all the twists and turns. One important side character in the saga is Aaron Quinn’s ex, Andrea Roberts — here’s what happened to her.
For those who haven’t seen the show, in 2015, Aaron Quinn and Denise Huskins, his girlfriend, were asleep late one night when a man forced his way into Quinn’s Vallejo, California home. In a plot too elaborate to be believed, that man took Huskins hostage for ransom, and in the aftermath, Quinn went to the police, but at first, Vallejo police assumed he killed Huskins and then lied about it.
Huskins reappeared 48-hours later
Fast-forward to two days later, when Huskins reemerged hundreds of miles away in Huntington Beach, California — dazed and traumatized, but for the most part unharmed. With Huskins back, police suspected the whole thing was a hoax, and Huskins faked her kidnapping in a plan that seemed, in their mind, a little too much like the recent blockbuster film and bestselling book Gone Girl. Accordingly, in the press, Huskins’ ordeal became known as “the Gone Girl kidnapping.”
But as the Netflix show points out, whoever abducted Huskins told her his target wasn’t Huskins at all, but Quinn’s ex, Andrea Roberts. Roberts — also a blonde woman — was unfaithful and had recently broken Quinn’s heart. Nonetheless, Quinn also admitted he hadn’t been entirely truthful in his new relationship about his unresolved feelings for his ex right before Huskins’ disappearance.
What happened to Aaron Quinn’s ex?
In one of many truth-is-stranger-than-fiction plot developments in the show, Aaron Quinn, Denise Huskins, and Andrea Roberts, Quinn’s ex-fiancée, were all physical therapists who worked together. That fact, combined with Quinn admitting he still struggled with feelings for Roberts when Huskins was abducted, practically handed Vallejo police a motive for Huskins’ assumed murder.
Roberts did not contribute to the Netflix documentary. Roberts was, however, questioned by the police investigating Huskins’ reported kidnapping. She can be heard in interrogation footage describing what it was like to work with her ex and his new girlfriend. Little else is known about Roberts’ life post-2015. Nor was it ever made clear why Roberts was targeted in the abduction. One might assume the perpetrator simply mixed up the two women.
In an interview with Variety, American Nightmare producers Felicity Morris and Bernadette Higgins said they notified Roberts about the series, but she declined to participate. Higgins added, “I think she probably was dragged into it more than she ever wanted to be in the first place. We obviously knew that she had nothing to do with it. It was just a terrible set of coincidences.”
