Woman speaks for first time after getting trapped in car for 6 days in Indiana

CBS News

11-06-2025

An Indiana woman spoke for the first time Tuesday after surviving six days in a ditch following a car crash back in March.
Brieonna Cassell, Brie for short, was found inside her car in Newton County, Indiana, on Tuesday, March 15 — six days after her family reported her missing.
Thirteen surgeries later, Cassell can show you the proof of every rod, plate, and pin put in her legs and arms.
"The first like 11, I believe, were every other day once they started," Cassell said.
For the last three months, Cassell was at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, Illinois, recovering after her car crashed into a ditch.
"And then my car crunched like an accordion," Cassell said.
Cassell said she fell asleep behind the wheel on a rural Newton County road. Her legs were trapped in the car, and so she couldn't move.
"I was like, 'Well, go to sleep — hopefully, somebody finds you,'" Cassell said. "Woke up in the morning, and I was still there, and I was all like, 'Now I've got to figure out how to get out of here.'"
For six days, Cassell drank water from her cardigan, stayed warm from a mattress topper, and used a flashlight to try to get drivers' attention. Meanwhile, her mom, Kim Brown, reported her missing.
"I was just screaming to God, 'Please let my baby come home,'" Brown said. "'I don't care how you bring her home. Just let her come home.'"
Brown's prayers were answered when a man named Johnny Martinez — who was driving a 10-foot-tall tractor working for Deyoung Drainage on County Road 600S near County Road 300E near the Newton County Landfill — saw what turned out to be Cassell's car crashed in a ditch by the side of the road. He contacted his supervisor, Morocco Fire Chief Jeremy Vanderwall, who came to Cassell's rescue.
"She said: 'I didn't think I was going to make it out of here. I thought I was going to die in this ditch,'" said Vanderwall.
"I see the tire come up and stop," said Cassell, "and then I was just so relieved."
Cassell said she has not seen Martinez or Vanderwall since that day. She said the day they reunite will be an emotional one.
"When they pulled me out of that car, my flesh had been rotting for two days. I had been smelling it," Cassell said. "I didn't think my legs were coming out of the car with me."
Cassell is home with her mom now. An ambulance drove her back just this past Saturday morning.
A group of volunteers also built a ramp at the front of her home. Cassell said her goal is now to write a book about her experience and focus on physical therapy.
"I know I'll be able to walk eventually," she said. "Like, I'm not doubting that."
It was also in Northwest Indiana back in December 2023 that Matt Reum went through a very similar experience. Reum survived for six days at in a ravine along Salt Creek in Portage, Indiana, after his pickup truck fell off an overpass on Interstate 94.
The pickup truck was smashed and mangled, and he couldn't get out – nor reach his phone to call for help. So he just remained there, surviving on rainwater and using his airbag as a blanket when it got cold out, for six days.
On Dec. 26, 2023, two fishermen who had come to scout out a spot along the creek just happened across Reum—and called 911 for first responders to come to his rescue. Reum had to have his leg amputated, but survived, and was expressing his perspective and gratitude a year later.