An observant elementary school employee in Antioch, California, is credited with stopping the alleged kidnapping of an 11-year-old while on her way to work. The girl responded by saying he was a friend.
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“I said, ‘Sweetheart, is that your dad?'” Ferguson told KGO.
KABC The teacher’s aide noticed the girl in a man’s auto, blocked it with her own vehicle and ordered her to get out. He then allegedly grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her into the vehicle, but a Sutter Elementary employee intervened.
Salazar had no relation to the girl.
Police said the man, later identified as 51-year-old Santiago Salazar, had followed the girl as she was walking to school and lured her over to his vehicle.
Even Ferguson is a little surprised at herself.
“It was kind of like a superwoman power thing”, Ferguson told KGO-TV. “I can’t believe it did that!” said Sandra Ferguson, who works at Sutter Elementary School in Antioch.
Reports suggest that Salazar, of Brentwood, Calif., did not try to run away when the police apprehended him. The girl’s family has personally thanked Ferguson.
In the end, the girl was not hurt, and the school principal praised the aide who unwittingly saved her life, calling Ferguson “a guardian angel, preventing something awful from happening”.
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The teaching assistant got the schoolgirl out of the auto and called police, who arrested Santiago Salazar, 51, on suspicion of kidnapping.
