Teen missing for more than a year found at Duluth home

DULUTH, Ga. — A teen missing for more than a year has been found at a home in Duluth.

The FBI said Hailey Burns, 17, from Charlotte, N.C., is with back her family after being tracked to the Gwinnett County home.

Burns parents said they have dreamed of the moment when they would be reunited with their daughter.

The FBI was offering a $15,000 reward for information that would lead them to Burns’ whereabouts.

Neighbors along the Duluth street where she was found never imagined she was being hidden inside the quiet home.

"Well, first of all, it’s heartbreaking,” neighbor Kerry Fetter told Channel 2’s Rikki Klaus.

Burns disappeared from her Charlotte, North Carolina house more than a year ago. The FBI said they found her living at a home on Seneca Trail in Duluth.

“It was very shocking to know that in our neighborhood,” Fetter said. “It’s just not right.”

Michael Ren Wysolovski, 31, was taken into custody and is facing a number of charges in connection to Burns’ disappearance.

We have a reporter and photographer at the suspect's court hearing this afternoon. Watch Channel 2 Action News starting at 4 p.m. for updates.

Fetter told Klaus that she saw Wysolovski only once since living in the Duluth neighborhood.

“I was coming back from somewhere, and he was opening the car door, and he just got in,” Fetter said.

Another neighbor said he saw the teen unloading groceries, and Burns waved back to say hello. He said he had no clue she was being held captive.

“I thought nobody was living there actually because everything was closed up, the drapes, the blinds," the neighbor said, not identifying himself.

This weekend a tipster materialized from an unlikely place: Romania, according to Burns’ mother.

“It was a dream come true,” Hailey’s mother, Shaunna Burns, said.

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Channel 2's sister-station in charlotte, WSOC-TV, spoke with the teen's relieved parents Sunday evening.

The Shaunna Burns said Hailey met a Romanian woman online, told her she was missing and the teen sent the stranger a picture from the window.

Burns’ parents said the tipster reached out to them and within five hours, investigators had found her.

“We know that this happy ending is not the norm. It is the exception to the rule. We want people to know that there are happy endings to this kind of story,” Shaunna Burns said.

The FBI said they continue to investigate, and more charges could be coming.

WSOC-TV contributed to this article.

Cox Media Group