Girl punches suspected kidnapper in face, escapes

A suspected kidnapper got more than he bargained for Tuesday when he tried to abduct an 11-year-old Carson City girl, who escaped after punching him in the face.

The victim and two other girls, 10 and 12 years old, were in the 1100 block of Woodside Drive returning from a trip to a store about noon when the man, described as in his 50s, pulled up to the group in his car and grabbed the victim by the hair.

As he tried to pull her into the vehicle, the three girls began screaming and fighting.

"I was hitting him and socking him and stuff, and my friend had me by the legs so I wouldn't go all the way in the car," the 11-year-old said.

The victim said the man bit her chest and neck.

"Then I socked him in the jaw and he let me go, and my friend pulled me out," she said.

The girls got away unharmed and the man drove away.

The trio waited three hours to report the incident to police.

When asked why she waited so long, the girl said she tried to contact her mother. At 2:40 p.m., when her mother got home from work, the girl called police.

Dozens of officers scoured the neighborhood, knocking on doors and stopping vehicles that matched the description.

Children from the apartment complex on scooters and bicycles buzzed around police officers as they interviewed tenants.

Eight-year-old Johnathan Partida said his mother has talked to him about children being kidnapped.

"She told me don't be alone," he said as he stood in the parking lot on his scooter. "And when I see a stranger I go home."

This wasn't the first time the victim had been confronted by the man, she said.

"He has bothered us before, always saying 'Come here' or he'll give us something," she said. "He's just dumb. Always drunk."

She said once the man had even flashed himself at her. "He's perverted," she said.

About two weeks ago, she said, she'd pointed the man out to her mother when they were at the grocery store.

Chief Deputy Scott Burau of the Carson City Sheriff's Department said the girls' response was the right one.

"They reacted very appropriately. They got loud. They started screaming. They became very offensive. In a situation like this it was very appropriate. The only thing better would have been an adult in the immediate area that would have seen this occur," Burau said.

The suspect is described as a Hispanic man in his 50s. He was driving a burgundy colored, "junky" sedan with rear-end damage.

He was wearing a cowboy hat, snake-skin boots, a green-white-and-red checkered long sleeve shirt. He had salt-and-pepper colored hair, with a bushy, salt-and-pepper colored moustache.

Anyone with information is asked to call the Carson City Sheriff's Department at 887-2020 ext. 1300.

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Anyone with information is asked to call the Carson City Sheriff's Department at 887-2020 ext. 1300.