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A security expert told Fox News Digital the first 48 hours are critical in the search for an American Christian missionary kidnapped in the West African nation of Niger, who may have already been moved between Islamic State-controlled areas where an ISIS offshoot operates.

Bryan Stern, founder of the crisis response group Grey Bull Rescue, said in an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital that in most organized kidnappings, those who seize a hostage are rarely the same people who hold them.

“What happens in most of these cases is whoever took the hostage isn’t who’s holding on to the hostage,” Stern said. “The people who hold hostages generally are a lot smarter, a lot more capable, less disposable… so getting to them as soon as possible do

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