DOROTHY LEE BARNETT ELUDED THE FBI FOR TWO DECADES AFTER FLEEING THE U.S. WITH HER DAUGHTER, NOW SHE TELLS HER SIDE OF THE STORY IN "48 HOURS: DEAR SAVANNA"

Saturday, Dec. 5, 2015

Dorothy Lee Barnett eluded the FBI for two decades after she fled the United States with her infant daughter in tow. Now, for the first time, Barnett shares her story in 48 HOURS: "Dear Savanna" to be broadcast Dec. 5, 2015 (10:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

Editor's note: This broadcast was preempted for breaking news on Nov. 14, 2015.

In 1994, Barnett was in the midst of a bitter divorce with then-husband Harris Todd. One day she and the couple's 11-month-old daughter Savanna vanished. The disappearance launched an international search for Barnett and Savanna that didn't end until she was arrested in Queensland, Australia, in 2013.

"I feel the FBI and every other law enforcement agency underestimated me," Barnett tells correspondent Maureen Maher.

"Our investigation spanned the United States and the globe. We searched Belize. We searched Central America and South Africa," FBI agent Chris Quick tells 48 HOURS. "Dorothy Lee was very equipped in running from the law. She thought about this. She was planned and determined."

The case, which 48 HOURS has been covering since 1999, raises significant questions about parental child abduction, the issues that emerge in a bitter divorce, and what penalties should be leveled on a parent who flees with a child after losing a custody case.

When Barnett fled her home in Charleston, S.C., she headed to Europe, where she spent time in Germany, France, then Malaysia, Singapore, South Africa, Botswana and Australia. Barnett became Alex Geldenhuys. Unbeknownst to Savanna, she became Samantha Geldenhuys. While they were on the run, Barnett also kept a secret diary for her daughter, planning one day to tell her the whole story of her life.

"I knew my mom as Alex my entire life," Samantha tells 48 HOURS. "But in reality, she wasn't Alex at all."

Back home, Barnett was vilified in the press and called angry and violent. There were allegations that she was mentally ill. In a 1999 interview, Todd told 48 HOURS Barnett was a ticking time bomb. "You never know whether you're going to come through the door and have a flower pot launched," he said then.

In her sitdown with 48 HOURS, Barnett paints a very different picture of the relationship. She also admits that when she was abroad, she feared getting caught "every day."

The FBI wasn't so sure. "I thought this was going to be one of those unsolved mysteries that would never be solved," Quick says.

That changed in 2011, when the FBI got a tip that Barnett was living in Queensland, Australia. And then there was a knock on Barnett's door in 2013.

"I realized that it was all up. That they'd found me," Barnett says. "And I knew that I would have to face the consequences of what I did 20 years before."

Barnett and Savanna open up to 48 HOURS about their extraordinary life before Barnett's arrest and how their lives have unfolded since.

48 HOURS: "Dear Savanna" is produced by Liza Finley and Ryan Smith. Peter Schweitzer is the senior producer. Susan Zirinsky is the senior executive producer.

Follow 48 HOURS on Twitter and Facebook, Instagram and CBSNews.com. Listen to 48HOURS podcasts at Play.it.