Broken Harts, Episode 7: 'Stone-Cold Narcissist'
When news of the tragic crash involving the Hart family broke last March, people from as far away as Italy and Australia wanted to know what had happened; many were specifically worried about the fate of Hannah and Devonte, whose whereabouts were at the time still largely unknown. Groups like Missing Hart Children and Honoring the Hart Children began popping up across Facebook, dedicated to locating the whereabouts of the two then missing Hart kids. Other groups, like Hart Family Case Discussion (which has 1,411 members), Hart Family Case Discussion (with 170 members), What Happened to the Harts: Their History, the Crash, the Kids (490 members), and Hart Family Crash Theories (101 members) also began appearing thereafter. In a short period of time, the Harts’ story had piqued international interest.
The groups are home to a number of different avenues of discussion, from adoption and Jen and Sarah’s history of child abuse to whether they were racist and whether or not the drive over the cliff was premeditated or spontaneous. Group members debated the Harts’ financial situation, their clothing, their smiles, their sleeping arrangements, the contents of their refrigerator, their decor, and even why Jen and Sarah let their chickens roam free in the house. Amy Atlas, founder of Finding the Missing Hart Children/Honoring the Hart Children, explains that many members of these Facebook groups spend upwards of 20 hours a day involved in these discussions. “At peak level, I would absolutely say myself and a few others were working on this 20 hours a day," she says. "So we were sleeping for about four hours and doing this full-time.”
Sleuth groups like these frequently proliferate on Facebook after a grisly crime, and while these groups are dedicated to uncovering the truth, they often breed intense, emotional discussions that spill over into other corners of the Web, like Twitter, where friends of the Hart family will sometimes receive hate mail.
To some extent, there's a certain poetic justice to the Harts’ immortalization on Facebook, considering it was Jen’s preferred mode of communication. But in recent months it's also been uncovered that this wasn't the only world wherein Jen Hart was entrenched. Apparently, Jen was also an avid video gamer, playing for hours on end while Sarah was at work (which would explain why Devonte told Dana DeKalb that his moms weren’t really paying attention to what was going on at home).
Drew, who met Jen when they were both playing the game Oz: Broken Kingdom, explains how dedicated she was to the game. “She was good. By good, I mean she developed relationships very quickly with people…. She got to know them on a personal level," he says. "Jen really shined when there was a newcomer. If someone didn't know how to conquer a particular part of the game, like, that was her wheelhouse. She loved the bird with the broken wing.”
Jen and Drew would spend hours chatting about everything—the game, politics, their families. As with so many who thought they knew Jen Hart, Drew has really struggled to wrap his mind around the crash, trying to comprehend why Jen did what she did. “Her life had become wrapped up in this image that she so carefully crafted. This image of her as this doting mom and champion of racial reconciliation," he says. "She had identified herself by this cause, if you will, that when she came to grips with the fact that it was all going to fall apart, I think…'Either I get to maintain my preferred image, or none of us get to maintain anything at all.'"
Drew once described Jen as “highly competitive.” Another gamer called her a “stone-cold narcissist." It was common for Jen to sit near the top of the rankings due in large part to the sheer number of hours she spent in front of the screen. Team members teased her about how she was the first to crack a really complex part of the game. Drew told her she must have developed a diagram to figure it out. In fact, she said, she had.
Some believe Jen's entrenchment in the gaming world points to a case of untreated depression. But was it depression that drove Jen and her family over that cliff last March? Some say yes. Others, particularly those in Facebook sleuth groups, speculate that the Harts decided to end it all because of their debt (around $14,000). Another persistent theory: that one of the Hart moms was terminally ill. In a Facebook status update, Jen vaguely blames health issues for a months-long hiatus, though nothing in Glamour's interviews and the Harts’ emails and paperwork points to physical illness of any kind.
So what, then, did facilitate this tragedy? That, and more, next time on Broken Harts.
Subscribe now to our new podcast, Broken Harts, from Glamour and HowStuffWorks and based on this story from the October 2018 issue of Glamour. New episodes will air each Tuesday; find them on Apple, Google, Spotify, or wherever you like to get your podcasts. For the full transcript of this episode, click here. Have any tips, feedback, or questions? Email us at brokenhartspodcast@gmail.com.
Top photo: AP Images
