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Missing Naomi Irion was being sexually harassed at work and went on anonymous date before abduction

The 18-year-old, who has been missing for 12 days, was abducted in her own car from a Walmart parking lot in Fernley, Nevada at 5.25 am on March 12

FERNLEY, NEVADA: Family members of missing Nevada teen Naomi Irion revealed that she went on a date with a stranger the day before she vanished and complained about being sexually harassed at work.

The 18-year-old, who has been missing for 12 days, was abducted in her blue sedan from a Walmart parking lot in Fernley, Nevada at 5.25 am on March 12. She was reportedly waiting for the shuttle bus to take her to her workplace at a Panasonic factory in Reno, where she was allegedly being sexually harassed. Naomi's brother said her employer knew about the alleged harassment and elected to handle it "internally". Meanwhile, the kidnapper is still at large and remains unidentified.

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Naomi Irion was seen in surveillance footage waiting in her car at the parking lot when an unidentified man approached the vehicle, opened the door of the driver's seat, and said something to force the alleged victim to move over. The suspect then drove out of the lot, and the car was found abandoned less than a mile away on March 15. There has been no sign of the girl since.

Speaking to the Daily Mail, her distraught family said she was exploring life as a "free, young American" after having grown up in sheltered communities in Russia, Germany, and South Africa due to her diplomat father's job in the State Department. They said Naomi moved to the US last year to live with her older brother Casey Valley, an Apple employee who served in the Navy as a nuclear machinist from 2009 to 2016. The missing 18-year-old wanted to learn how to drive, go on dates, and attend community college after moving to America.

Naomi Irion went on a date with an unidentified man in Reno the day before she vanished. Her family said they likely met on a dating app, but they do not know which one as she had accounts on Tinder, Hinge, and Bumble. "She really wanted to experience life in America being an American kid," her mother Diana told the Daily Mail on Tuesday. "Most kids get to learn how to drive a car and go on dates and get some freedom but in the diplomatic community overseas you can’t have that. You can’t learn how to drive a car. You can’t really go on dates safely. You have to be secure and there’s a lot of security that keeps us safe. She hadn’t experienced life without that yet," Diana Irion continued, adding, "She really wanted to explore herself as a free American young woman and what that looked like for her. She was so excited to move back to America."

The embattled mother flew to Nevada from South Africa, where she lives with her husband and their three younger sons. Naomi's father Herve Irion, who works for the foreign service and has held posts in Moscow, Pretoria, and Frankfurt, also flew to Nevada with their three Ukrainian-born adopted sons to join the search for his daughter. The family said Naomi had never driven nor gone on dates freely until this year, the Daily Mail reported.