Wednesday, March 12, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.
Reports of a man kidnapping a 5-year-old girl from a Boulder City park turned out to be a false alarm.
But that doesn't mean children are safe to run the streets.
Now, there are reports of two men trying to lure children into their pickups, Boulder City Police Detective Kristina Stephens said. The latest incidents mark the fifth and sixth kidnap attempts, police said.
Since Feb. 11, a man in his 60s has tried to lure children into his pickup. And now a second man in his 40s has made one attempt.
The case Monday night of the missing 5-year-old girl had a happy ending: Her mother had gone to the park where the girl and her father were and took the girl home. But she didn't tell her husband.
"When the father turned his back, the girl was gone," Stephens said. "The husband was crying. He thought she was gone. We had a missing 5-year-old and we thought the worst."
Police started a neighborhood search. Stephens drove to the girl's house, just in case. That's when she found her safe at home with her mother.
Last Thursday, two men in separate incidents tried to coax children into their pickups.
The first occurred when a man in his 40s drove up in a brownish-red older Chevy pickup about 5:30 p.m. near where boys were congregated, near Birch Street and Nevada Highway, and asked them to come over to him, Stephens said.
They didn't. Instead, they went inside one of their houses and the man drove away.
Later, when the boys were leaving with one of their fathers to drive to McDonald's, the boys said, "That's the guy, that's the guy who tried to get us," Stephens said.
The man had parked his pickup in the alleyway behind the house. The truck's lights and engine were off. When the father drove up to the driver's side of the pickup, the man started his engine and sped off, Stephens said.
But the father took down the license plate. If the man is the same as the truck owner, he was once arrested on a sexual assault charge, Stephens said. As of yet, police have not been able to contact him for questioning.
Earlier that day, at 1501 Nevada Highway, a man in his 60s tried to lure a 6-year-old boy who was walking home in the evening. He whispered to the boy, telling him to come over to him, Stephens said.
"The boy ran, screaming and crying," she said. "He found some bigger kids."
This time the man was on foot, but witnesses told police they saw the man leave in a white pickup, the same truck described by children in previous incidents.
Police Chief Dave Mullin said because he has a small department, he has assigned reserve officers in unmarked cars, detectives, "myself and officers in administrative positions who can be spared to go out there."
His hope is that they'll find the man sitting in his pickup "and he's on probation or parole and we can arrest him." Otherwise, all they can do is identify him.
"If we run him off, we just displace him and he becomes someone else's problem," Mullin said. "If we catch him, we can at least identify him. Normally, the people who do this don't stop. They continue. Our number one priority is that no child gets kidnapped."
Because of the publicity, police are getting a lot of tips.
"We get people calling in from North Las Vegas saying their neighbor is the one doing it," Mullin said. "Detective Stephens is following up on 250 leads. We're taking them all very seriously. The last thing we want to do is lose a kid."
Stephens said, "The citizens are our eyes and ears. We've had calls from Utah and Arizona, and Metro patrol officers have been wonderful, running names (of registered sexual assaulters) for us."
The surfacing of a second suspect in his 40s may be a copycat incident, Stephens said.
"The publicity is probably going to bring perverts out of the woodwork," she said.
While police are encouraging children to get a license plate number for the truck, they also are asking them to think of their safety first.
"I tell the kids not to put themselves in any danger by trying to get a license plate," Stephens said. "My main concern is that they get away. I'm real impressed so far with these kids. We pray to God that nothing happens."
Now that the elderly man has gotten out of his truck, police have a better description of him. He's about 6 feet tall and skinny. His face and hands are very wrinkled, and he usually wears a baseball cap, a brown leather jacket and bifocal wire-wrimmed glasses. His white compact pickup with black interior has a camper shell with black tinted windows.
The second suspect has olive skin with short, spiked black hair.
Boulder City Police are asking anyone with information to call them at 293-9274.
archive
