Jason & Julia Potter

In November 2014, 6-year-old Julia Potter was abducted by her father, Jason. The two went missing during a scheduled visit at Jason’s home in North Seattle, and in the years since, evidence has surfaced that Jason may have carefully planned this disappearing act…

Carlina White's world shattered in an instant when she uncovered a truth that had been buried for over two decades: her entire identity was a lie. For years, she had lived as a woman named Nejdra Nance, believing she knew who she was, where she came from, and the family that raised her. But a gnawing feeling of uncertainty had always haunted her - a shadow of doubt that led her to dig deeper into her past.

One day, Carlina discovered something that no one could have prepared her for: she was not Nejdra Nance. She was Carlina White, a baby who had been abducted from a Harlem hospital in 1987. Stolen from her mother's arms, she was raised by the woman who had taken her - a woman she had called "Mom" all her life. The revelation left her devastated, leaving her grappling with an identity that was never truly hers.

Carlina ultimately confronted the reality that the family she had always known was built on a foundation of deception. The woman who raised her was not her mother. Her real parents were strangers, people who had spent years searching for their stolen child, never giving up hope. Carlina's heart ached as she imagined the pain her biological parents must have endured... the birthdays missed, the milestones lost to time, the endless prayers whispered in the dark.

Finally, after years of living with a stolen identity, Carlina White was reunited with her real mother, Joy White. The moment was bittersweet, filled with tears of both joy and sorrow, as the two women embraced for the first time in over two decades. The weight of lost time hung heavy between them, but in that embrace, there was also hope... hope that they could begin to rebuild what had been torn apart so long ago.

Carlina's story is one of tragedy and triumph, of loss and love. It is a reminder that even in the darkest of times, the truth has a way of coming to light, and in that truth, there is the possibility of healing. Of closure. Of love.

While today's episode isn't about Carlina White, it does bear some similarities. You see, today's episode also features a young girl abducted, but not by a stranger in a hospital, but rather, by a trusted family member. And Carlina's story is one that the abducted girl's mother has recently posted on her Facebook page, providing hope that she will one day be reunited with her own daughter.

This is the story of Jason and Julia Potter.

Julia Potter was born on December 18th, 2007 in Bulgaria, although some publications list the date of her birth as December 8th, 2007. Her mother, Ralitsa, was from Bulgaria, and her father, Jason Potter, was from the U.S. So Julia, born in Bulgaria, would be raised in the U.S. as an American citizen alongside her parents. All three lived together at their home in Seattle, Washington, and for a brief moment in time, things were happy.

Nicknamed "Juli" or "Chiki" by her parents, Julia was, by all accounts, a normal little girl who liked to draw and paint pictures, mainly of herself and her parents. A fan of anything princess-related, Julia's bedroom was adorned with Disney memoribilia and what seemed like dozens of shades of pink.

Unfortunately, like roughly half of all marriages, the marriage between Julia's parents, Ralitsa and Jason Potter, ended. Their marriage had been fraught with challenges throughout Julia's first few years of life, and that ultimately reached a head when she was still very young. After the split, both parents vied for custody. What followed was a tough legal battle, with Julia's mother Ralitsa walking away with full custody. Jason became a non-custodial father, meaning that he had visitation with Julia but little else. However, he was still an active presence in her life.

In the Fall of 2014, Julia started the first grade. But sadly, she would only remain in her class for approximately two months.

During a visit with her father, Jason, that November, Julia disappeared. From what I've found, Jason had Julia over to his home for a visit and was supposed to return her to her mother afterward, but he simply never did. Hours passed, and Jason - along with Julia - failed to surface. As police would later find, Jason had seemingly fled from his home in North Seattle.

As authorities began to try and track down the missing duo, police reached out to Jason Potter's attorneys. Before disappearing, the 45-year-old father had reportedly told his legal representatives that he was "going off the grid," and seems to have followed through with that in the months that followed.

Following her disappearance in November 2014, the search was on for the missing Julia Potter, whose 7th birthday was quickly approaching. At the time, it was reported, she had medium-length brown hair that extended down to her shoulders, hazel eyes, stood around 4 & 1/2 feet tall, and weighed approximately 55 pounds.

Investigators stated that they did not believe that Julia's father, Jason Potter, would intentionally hurt her. Myrle Carner with Crime Stoppers of Puget Sound told FOX 13:

"We're not talking about a guy that's necessarily a bad guy. We're talking about a dad that's made a bad decision."

Despite that initial belief, though, authorities feared that a life on the run would not be beneficial in any way to Julia. Living her life in such a way was undoubtedly going to impact not only her physical health in a myriad of ways, but also influence her long-term psychological development. Psychologist and best-selling author Gregg Jantz said as much to FOX 13 back in 2019, that this could lead to a variety of emotional problems for Julia, as well as lifelong anxiety:

"We'll even see an early onset of childhood depression because of this isolation factor."

Sadly, because this was a case of parental abduction, the case did not receive much attention at all. In fact, of the roughly handful of articles on this story, almost none were published before 2019... roughly five years later. And even then, there were just a couple of articles from FOX 13 and their programming, which highlight unsolved cases in western Washington.

Unfortunately, this lack of coverage is something that hasn't changed much in the years since. I am from the area where this story unfolded, and I lived in Washington at the time, but was completely unaware of this story playing out when it did. It's hard to say whether any more exposure would have helped bring this case to resolution, but as we'll touch on, this lack of a spotlight may have helped Julia's father, Jason Potter, hide in plain sight.

In the wake of Julia's disappearance, it would be learned by investigators that the divorce between Ralitsa and Jason Potter had not been amicable. Tensions between the two had been swirling for some time, and in some of the posts made to her Facebook page - titled "Finding abducted Julia Potter, 16 years old, WA, US" - Ralitsa has made posts alluding to therapy sessions Jason had attended in the months prior to their divorce. According to comments she made, Jason had brought along Julia to these therapy sessions when she was as young as three years old.

Because of the specific details, I'll refrain from including the name of this therapist, but Ralitsa seems to have alluded to the idea that these therapy sessions embedded certain ideas in Julia's mind about her, Julia's mother. She then hints that these ideas were used as evidence by Jason and his family members in court to assert that she'd been abusive. In total, she seems to have insinuated that this was a form of brainwashing, which - if it unfolded exactly as she claimed - would be hard to deny.

In these comments made online, Ralitsa claims that Jason made 21 referrals to Child Protective Services over 3 years regarding Ralitsa's home environment, but that none of them ever went anywhere. And it seems like, ultimately, the judges deciding custody sided with her. Jason became the non-custodial parent, meaning that there wasn't even shared custody. He would have non-supervised visitation with Julia, and it was during one of these visits that the two disappeared.

Now, it's hard for me to verify any of the information provided by Ralitsa through her Facebook page. Court cases involving children or custody agreements are often kept pretty safeguarded, and for good reason (don't read into this as me complaining - I'm not). But I do think that these comments shine a light on the relationship between Jason and Ralitsa Potter in the months prior to Julia's abduction, as well as the seeds Jason seems to have planted in Julia's mind early on, asserting that her mother was abusive or that her home was unsafe. Which, it seems, like the courts found zero evidence of, considering they later gave Ralitsa full custody.

In the wake of Julia Potter's disappearance, authorities set out to highlight details about the missing girl: her height, her weight, her hair and eye color, etc. But they also set out to disseminate information about her father and potential abductor, Jason Potter.

Born on September 16th, 1969, Jason was 45 years old at the time of Julia's disappearance. Now, nearly ten years later, his 55th birthday is quickly approaching.

Back in 2014, Jason stood around 5'10" tall and weighed approximately 170 pounds, with brown hair that was beginning to gray and hazel eyes. Many of those attributes are unlikely to have changed, but his hair has likely grayed and/or thinned, and he may or may not have a beard, but more on that in a bit.

Police have since highlighted that Jason had family members in both Seattle and Olympia, Washington, as well as friends in the Tacoma and Bellingham areas. Based on information they've never disclosed, investigators have reason to believe that Jason may have been sheltered or kept hidden by his loved ones, who are protecting him from the law.

Jason also had an interest in boats, as well as a link to Oregon City, Oregon.

After vanishing with Julia in November 2014, a $250,000 federal warrant was issued for Jason's arrest, and he has been wanted on federal kidnapping charges ever since. Despite the severity of his situation, though, he seems to have tried to make light of things when just days after abducting his daughter, Jason changed his profile picture on Facebook to a picture of legendary singer Lionel Richie. The image includes the quote:

"Hello? Is it me you're looking for?"

In comments made to his lawyer back in 2014, Jason Potter insinuated that he'd be going "off the grid" in the months ahead. While this could mean almost anything, such as hiding in plain sight, a part of me thinks that he may have meant it in a literal sense.

The Pacific Northwest is a pretty vast place. I once had a family friend from New York come to visit and they were amazed at how expansive and blanketed with forests everything is. Once you get outside of the I-5 corridor, western Washington is absolutely covered in dense, lush forests. While I've never personally had the inclination to go and live in the woods, I feel like there are many worse places to do it than in western Washington. Outside of the area surrounding the Puget Sound, the population density is pretty low, and despite the widespread belief that the weather in Washington is constantly pouring rain, that just isn't the case. Western Washington is often cloudy and rainy, but it's usually more of a misty rain; rarely does it ever downpour. With some exceptions, the winters are usually pretty mild, as well.

So with that in mind, is it possible that Jason Potter lived up to his word? Did he take Julia off with him into the woods, where they've lived off the grid over the past ten years (similar to the 2018 film "Leave No Trace")?

A woman posted a comment on the "Finding abducted Julia Potter' Facebook page, in which she claims to have seen a pair matching Jason and Julia's description along the northern Olympic Peninsula in Washington state. This is an area that is great for hiking and outdoors activities, and it's a place I've gone hiking and exploring with my own friends many times. In this woman's comment, she claims to have gotten an uneasy feeling from the man and his daughter, and she believes that the man was none other than Jason Potter. She claims to have not had cell reception at the time, but later contacted federal authorities to inform them of this potential sighting (it's unknown if they followed up on this).

Potential sightings like this have led some to believe that Jason and Julia might have truly gone "off the grid." If so, it's possible that Julia might not even know she's missing. She was only six years old when she disappeared, so if they've been living out in the woods since then, it would likely be the only life she's ever truly known. She wouldn't know any better, and just assume that everyone else in the world lives similarly. For her sake, I hope that's not the case.

As the months began to drag on into years, authorities theorized that Jason might have been shielded by family members in or around the Seattle/Tacoma area, or even down south a bit in Olympia. Perhaps he'd been able to live in their homes, alongside Julia, who he'd kidnapped back in 2014 to keep her from her mother. Yet after all this time, their whereabouts remain almost entirely unknown, despite both state and federal authorities conducting searches for him.

It wasn't until September 2021 that authorities believed they'd found some trace of Jason at a nursing home in Olympia, Washington. Olympia, the state capital, is located roughly sixty miles south of Seattle, where Jason and Julia had last been seen nearly seven years prior. Apparently, Jason's father was a resident at the nursing home, and staff had reportedly recognized Jason and contacted police, but by the time officers arrived at the nursing home, the figure believed to be Jason was already gone.

What Jason Potter may look like with a beard

Because of the timing of this incident, September 2021, the nursing home itself was still maintaining pretty strict COVID-19 protocols, and for that reason, Jason wasn't allowed inside to visit with his father. He reportedly whined and whinged to staff that he'd "drove a long way," but none of the witnesses there would see him getting into or getting out of a vehicle. However, the staff member that recognized Jason claimed that she'd seen him there before and that he had grown out a full beard.

Jason has reportedly not even tried to contact his father in this nursing home since that date in September 2021.

At around the same time this information was released, authorities announced that Jason could have fled as far away as the Himalayas, India, or Nepal. Although how they came upon this information, I cannot say.

Surprisingly, though, another little tidbit was revealed, which shed a new light on this entire story.

When authorities unveiled this alleged sighting of Jason Potter in September 2021 along with the news that he might have made it to South Asia, they also unveiled another piece of information that was incredibly unusual.

Earlier this year, in January 2024, authorities theorized that Jason may have been dressing as a woman in order to conceal his identity from the public. Apparently, photographs of him dressed as a woman had been recovered from a website where he used to model, dressing up as a woman. These photos were taken before Julia's abduction in 2014, and Jason's profile on this website had been deleted at around the same time. But one single photo, which had been just one of several at the time, was all that remained for public viewing. Authorities released this photo, showing what Jason looked like when he'd dressed up as a woman. I'll make this photo visible on the podcast website, so just head there to take a look.

As you can imagine, this led to speculation online that this might have been how Jason eluded capture for nearly an entire decade, by changing his physical appearance in such a profound way.

For the record, I do not think that Jason Potter is trans. Based on what I've found, though, he does have a sibling who is. But it appears like the website where Jason posted these photos was a cross-dressing website, which does not mean he is trans in any way. However, knowing this - paired with his trans sibling - led some online to speculate that Jason might have been protected by his family in more ways than one, perhaps presenting himself as his sibling in order to easily get around the region.

This possibility actually does piss me off a little bit, because trans men and women, along with gender-nonconforming individuals, already face enough harassment as it is - something that I'm sure Jason is aware of, since his sibling (who I don't want to dox by identifying) has already transitioned themselves. And because this information has since been publicized, it only provides more ammunition to those that are already prejudiced against the trans community, and I hate it so much that Jason - a criminal who abducted his own daughter - may be trying to use this community as a shield against his own vile actions. Because for the countless people that choose to change genders, it can be a long, painstaking, and emotional process that requires jumping through legal hoops and oftentimes, immense personal hardship, but based on what's been reported, Jason seems to be using it as a mask to hide from the consequences of his actions.

So with that being said... if anyone feels like this episode is an excuse to discriminate or hate against the trans community, let me just say this emphatically. It's not. Trans rights are human rights, full stop. If you don't agree, then you and I will never see eye to eye.

Despite possibly changing his physical appearance to look like a woman, I have no reason to believe that Jason Potter is transitioning or has transitioned his gender. But he is a wanted fugitive who can clear all of this up by coming forward, taking ownership of his prior acts, and returning Julia to her mother.

Julia Potter, six years old at the time of her 2014 disappearance, would now be sixteen. If she's still alive, her entire childhood would have been spent living on the run, living in conditions that we can only guess at. Has she been living in the woods with her father? "Off the grid," as he once described? Has she been whisked around between various family members? Sleeping on an endless number of couches and air mattresses? Has she gone to school? Has she been able to make friends?

These details and more are things that Julia's mother has only been able to speculate about over the past decade, as she hopes that her daughter may one day return to her safe and sound. Ralitsa Potter has kept a diary filled with daily messages for Julia, which she hopes she'll one day get to share with her daughter. Speaking to FOX 13, Ralitsa described her ongoing situation, a living nightmare for any parent:

"It's an absurd situation. It's pure madness, actually, for every mother."

Ralitsa continues to post regularly on the Facebook page dedicated to the story, "Finding abducted Julia Potter." In one such passage, from the five-year mark of the case back in 2019, she wrote:

"Justice will triumph one day... Until then, I will keep seeing my girl at the face of every single girl I meet and my heart will weep from the pain of our forced separation."

Anyone with information is encouraged to reach out to the Seattle Police Department, who continue to oversee this case. You can reach them by phone at (206) 625-5011. Those that live in the Asian communities mentioned (Himalayas, India, Nepal) or in the Pacific Northwest (namely, western Washington and Oregon, maybe even British Columbia) look at the pictures of those involved and see if you recognize them. If you do, please contact the Seattle P.D. at (206) 625-5011. If you live internationally, you can contact your nearest embassy or consulate. You can also become eligible for a $1,000 cash reward by sending an anonymous tip to Crime Stoppers of Puget Sound at 1-800-222-TIPS. Once again, that's 1-800-222-TIPS. You can also use the P3 Tips app on your phone.

Until such a time, the stories of Jason and Julia Potter will remain unresolved.

Episode Information

Writing, research, hosting, and production by Micheal Whelan

Published on September 2nd, 2024

Music Credits

Original music created by Micheal Whelan

Outro/theme music created and composed by Ailsa Traves

Sources and Other Reading

LostNMissing. (n.d.). Julia Potter. LostNMissing.org. Retrieved from https://lostnmissing.org/missing/juliapotter/
For the Lost. (n.d.). Julia Potter. For the Lost. Retrieved from https://www.forthelost.org/family/jpotter.html
[Video]. (n.d.). Facebook. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=843047082452532
Potter, R. (2023). Life could be described as mastering the game of self-discovery. Medium. Retrieved from https://medium.com/@ralipotter/life-could-be-described-as-mastering-the-game-of-self-discovery-e206cc330e30
Investigation Discovery. (n.d.). Seattle: Jason Potter, Julia Potter abducted daughter. In Pursuit with John Walsh. Retrieved from https://www.investigationdiscovery.com/crimefeed/id-shows/on-tv0/in-pursuit-with-john-walsh/articles/seattle-jason-potter-julia-potter-abducted-daughter
FOX 13 Seattle. (2022). Seattle police asking for public's help in finding 7-year-old Julia Potter who disappeared with her dad. FOX 13 Seattle. Retrieved from https://www.fox13seattle.com/news/seattle-police-asking-for-publics-help-in-finding-7-year-old-julia-potter-who-disappeared-with-her-dad
GoFundMe. (n.d.). Julia Potter. GoFundMe. Retrieved from https://www.gofundme.com/f/ys4eh8
Child Find of America. (n.d.). Julia Potter. Child Find of America. Retrieved from https://childfindofamerica.org/julia-potter/
KIRO 7 News. (2014). Seattle police searching for abducted child last seen in 2014. KIRO 7 News. Retrieved from https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/seattle-police-searching-abducted-child-last-seen-2014/Y644AP4IEJGLDOYNJ25ZSGGXZ4/
KOMO News. (2021). Seattle police looking for girl abducted 7 years ago; suspect possibly seen in Olympia. KOMO News. Retrieved from https://komonews.com/news/local/seattle-police-looking-for-girl-abducted-7-years-ago-suspect-possibly-seen-in-olympia
FOX 13 Seattle. (2023). Seattle police release new age-progression photo of child abducted by biological father in 2014. FOX 13 Seattle. Retrieved from https://www.fox13seattle.com/news/seattle-police-release-new-age-progression-photo-of-child-abducted-by-biological-father-in-2014
[Video]. (n.d.). FOX 13 Seattle. Retrieved from https://www.fox13seattle.com/video/1393480
Reddit. (2024). Julia Potter: Missing for 10 years. Reddit. Retrieved from https://old.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/18pkb2e/julia_potter_missing_for_10_years/
Websleuths. (n.d.). WA - Julia Potter, 7, Seattle, 6 Nov 2014. Websleuths. Retrieved from https://www.websleuths.com/forums/threads/wa-julia-potter-7-seattle-6-nov-2014.273078/
[Video]. (n.d.). Facebook. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=566248387071401
[Post]. (n.d.). Facebook. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/100044197311100/posts/930847715065130