Angeline Hartmann, the newest correspondent on America’s Most Wanted, has tackled some tough cases: two teens kept in a dungeon. A 14-year-old raped and murdered. A toddler stuffed into a cooler and left on the side of a road.

She remembers her first case, a woman missing in Atlanta, where Hartmann, a rookie at WAGA-TV, was working solo to launch Georgia’s Most Wanted. “She was young and single, like me. I interviewed her aunt—the pain in her eyes, she had no answers,” says Hartmann. “I wanted to pay attention to these cases.”

When Hartmann’s husband, a special agent for the Department of Justice—they met at a crime scene—was transferred to Washington, she landed her “dream job” with America’s Most Wanted. She works with the police and FBI to find fugitives to profile for the show, re-creating stories from what are often heart-wrenching interviews with victims and their families.

“We cry together. For many, I become a therapist—I go to birthdays, weddings, and funerals,” says Hartmann.

Hartmann’s empathy may be genetic. Her mom, a nurse, met her father, who served in the Coast Guard, in the States, though both are Filipino. They’ve spent their lives bringing extended family to Hartmann’s native California. “They are the American dream,” says Hartmann.

Hartmann’s son, Tyler, was born in January. She says motherhood has fueled her passion. “This work teaches me you can never give up. And if there’s an arrest? It’s out of this world.”