A California girl who was kidnapped at the age of 11 in 1991 was found alive, having spent 18 years living in sheds and tents behind the home of her accused abductor, a convicted rapist who fathered two children with her, police said on Thursday.
Jaycee Dugard had been missing since she was snatched off a street by two people in a gray sedan while walking to a bus stop near her home in South Lake Tahoe, east of San Francisco, on June 10, 1991.
Dugard, now 29, was found after a parole officer for her accused kidnapper became was given a tip, leading to a search of his home near the town of Antioch, about 160km southwest of where she was abducted.
Police say the search turned up a hidden “backyard within a backyard” at the home of registered sex offender and convicted rapist Phillip Craig Garrido, where Dugard and the two children were confined in a series of sheds and tents.
“She was in good health but living in a backyard for 18 years must take its toll,” El Dorado County Undersheriff Fred Kollar told a news conference.
Carl Probyn, Dugard’s stepfather, said on television he and her mother “cried for about 10 minutes” after they were told by authorities that she had been found alive. Dugard was reunited with her mother on Thursday.
Dugard’s stepfather witnessed her abduction in 1991 and was a longtime suspect in the case. He said he saw someone reach out and grab her before the gray sedan sped away.
“It broke my marriage up. I’ve gone through hell. I mean I [was] a suspect up until yesterday,” a tearful Probyn, 60, said at his home in Orange, California.
Garrido, 58, and his wife Nancy Garrido, 54, were arrested over Dugard’s abduction and prosecutors said they were likely to be charged yesterday.
Authorities said Garrido was suspected of fathering two children with Dugard, girls now aged 11 and 15.
The break in the case came on Tuesday, when Garrido tried to enter the University of California, Berkeley campus with the two girls to pass out religious leaflets.
A campus police officer found his interaction with the girls suspicious and investigated his background. The officer discovered Garrido was a sex offender and alerted his parole officer.
Garrido was ordered to appear for a parole meeting and arrived on Wednesday with Dugard, who identified herself as “Allissa,” his wife, and two children. During questioning, corrections officials said he admitted to kidnapping Dugard.
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