Cartagena Awakening | No Man Left Behind

[Music] It was a loud bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. You know, it wasn't just an average knock. And, uh, I distinctly remember that that sounded very aggressive and very demanding. We were both asleep when I heard somebody pounding on Charlie's door, and I got out of bed.

Kelly had walked in, and he said, "There's somebody out at the door banging on the door." I had got up, went over to the door, and asked who it was. That was when they first said anything, communicating to me that they needed to come in the room. I couldn't tell how many people were out there by the talking back and forth. I couldn't tell if it was one or four.

Charlie was very suspicious, so he ran into where the other door was, opened it up a little bit, and peeked down the hall. I actually went over to the joining door and looked out. They were plainclothed, guns drawn. They had pistols. They looked up and saw me looking at them.

We were trying to deal with this as calmly as we could, trying to assess what our options were—no panic, just trying to find a solution, a way to get out of this situation without getting ourselves hurt. I was thinking how helpless we were, that there really wasn't any other option: either open the door or they would open the door.

I knew we were in trouble—serious trouble. I just didn't know how much. They rushed in and just immediately took Charlie into Charlie's bedroom and closed the door, and he was being interrogated.

I see another man walk in, walks around the corner of the bed, stands right in front of me. He raises his pistol with the hammer cocked, brings it up, and aims right at my head, right between my eyes, looking right at me. He says, "I am Renee Bitas."

It's never fun when somebody has a pistol pointed at you. You wonder if he knows what he's doing or if he’s going to have an accident. I had no idea what their intentions were. It was kind of puzzling why they would take him into another room and close the door. That might have added to the anticipation of him getting beaten up. That's when they decided to take us out of the room.