A 13-year-old kidnapped in Texas was rescued when a passerby saw her hold up a "help me" sign in a California parking lot, police said.
According to the Long Beach Police Department, a 61-year-old man named Steven Robert Sabalan forced the teenage girl into his car in San Antonio, Texas on July 6. The man allegedly threatened her at gunpoint and took her across state lines- nearly 1,400 miles- to California, where she was found three days later.
"Good Samaritans were in a parking lot when they saw the victim in a parked vehicle holding up a piece of paper with 'help me' written on it," a LBPD press release read. "They acknowledged the note and immediately called 9-1-1."
According to police, the girl also mouthed the words "help me" to passersby while the man was inside a laundromat.
The 61-year-old man of Cleburne, Texas was indicted in California on Thursday and charged with one count of kidnapping and one count of transportation of a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity.
"If you don't get in the car with me, I am going to hurt you," Sablan told the victim, according to court documents.
According to a press release, the girl left home on July 6 without telling her parents because she had plans to visit a friend who had moved to Australia a year earlier.
The Guardian reported that the victim had been near a bus stop in San Antonio, Texas, on 6 July when the suspect approached in a vehicle, pointed a gun at her and demanded that she get in.
The police said the girl was sexually assaulted while being brought to California, and they found a replica firearm in the vehicle.
On July 9, they stopped at a laundromat in Long Beach, Calif.
Mr Sablan told her to change clothes in the car and then took her clothes and went inside. This gave the girl the opportunity to write "Help Me!" on a piece of paper, the New York Times reported.
