More help sought in abduction case

Published 10:12 pm Tuesday, October 15, 2013

The Isle of Wight Sheriff’s Office is making a renewed plea to the public for help in locating and capturing a suspect in the Oct. 2 abduction and sexual assault of an 11-year-old girl.

“There are numerous details the victim provided that are key in this investigation, and we believe that an alert citizen may be able to provide that final tip we need by paying attention to those details,” sheriff’s office spokeswoman Kristin Wilda wrote in an email Tuesday.

Details of the case were sent this week to community and civic organizations in the hope somebody will recognize the suspect, his car or the scene of one of the assaults, which has not yet been located.

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The suspect took the girl from her Carrollton neighborhood shortly before 8 a.m. and drove her to two rural locations, where he assaulted her. He then dropped her back off near her bus stop after about four hours.

The girl reported her attacker was an older white male, possibly in his 40s, of medium build, about 5 feet 8 inches tall and weighing 175 pounds, with short blond hair and a thin blond beard with gray in a strip from his temples across his chin and no mustache.

He has bushy blond eyebrows, blue eyes, large full lips, teeth that are slightly yellowed, a wide nose, small hands with short fingers, and freckles covering his entire face and body.

The girl also reported he wore small, round, brown eyeglasses low on his nose, cut-off blue jean shorts, a tan T-shirt and brown and blue tennis shoes.

The girl did not see any tattoos or piercings. He was a nonsmoker and a slow speaker.

His car, a 1995-2001 two-door Chevrolet Cavalier, was gray or silver with black and gray interior, leather or vinyl seats, manual roll-up windows and some pieces missing from a section of cracked dash. It was newer-looking outside but older-looking inside.

Inside the car were three homemade clay sculptures — one star-shaped and painted with black stripes and the others green and pink, possibly made by children.

Law enforcement also are seeking the location of one of the assaults. It is an old, abandoned, two-story, wood-framed house. It has no shingles on the roof and is partially collapsing, and an old sofa can be seen through a collapsed wall.

The home is about 200 yards from the paved road but can be seen from the paved road. The sheriff’s office noted the 200-yard distance is the child’s estimate. There are discarded HVAC units in the rear yard.

Across the road from the abandoned house are newer homes. The closest one is a well-kept, two-story white house, with red shutters and a gray roof. There is a new wooden fence around the backyard, but no fencing around the front yard. An SUV was parked in the driveway of the newer home.

The man and girl were seen in rural Suffolk about 11 a.m., where he asked directions from a trash collector at the intersection of Longstreet Lane and Quaker Drive.

Law enforcement believes the unknown assault scene is located somewhere in southeast Virginia or northeast North Carolina, within about two hours’ drive of Carrollton. The other assault scene has been located off Route 258 in Isle of Wight County.