Kidnapping Scare Has A Happy Ending

Sat., Sept. 14, 1996

From Staff Reports

What appeared to be a kidnapping turned out to be a mix-up Friday when a Browne’s Addition girl was seen leaving a school bus stop with a stranger.

The man brought the girl back to her home nearly three hours later.

When the 5-year-old didn’t come home, friends and family had feared the worst. “Everybody started saying their prayers,” said Douglas Glover, a friend of the family.

The man, whom police would not identify, was bringing the girl back to her mother’s apartment in the 1700 block of West First when he was greeted by about a dozen neighbors and six police cruisers. Glover ran up and grabbed the girl from the man. Another family friend punched the stranger in the jaw.

The girl had been playing with his daughter, the man told police. She was missing from home from 3:30 to 6 p.m., said Al Odenthal, a Spokane police officer.

The man was not arrested, said police spokesman Dick Cottam. He declined to file charges against the person who punched him.

When police finished questioning the girl and her mother, the dozen neighbors that had gathered cheered and applauded.

, DataTimes

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