Posted on 05/12/2022 9:28:18 PM PDT by Trillian
A North Texas teenager disappeared after going to the bathroom at a Dallas Mavericks game. A week later, her parents found her on nude advertisements for sex trafficking online in Oklahoma City.
The harrowing incident is the basis for a lawsuit by the family against numerous organizations they said could have stopped the crime but didn't.
The 15-year-old went to the game with her father on April 8 at the American Airlines Center. She went missing after leaving to go the bathroom right before halftime, and surveillance video captured her leaving with a man.
The parents of the teenager said they were able to discover her whereabouts after seeing her photograph in nude online advertisements selling sex.
A week and a half later on April 18, police found the girl in a room at an Extended Stay America hotel more than 200 miles away from the arena.
"She was gone missing a total of 11 days," said attorney Zeke Fortenberry, who is representing the family.
Fortenberry's office released a statement identifying the Dallas Mavericks, the Dallas Police Department, and the American Airlines Center as groups that could have intervened to protect the girl but didn't.
He says that the father tried to file a missing person's report with the police but they told him to contact the North Richland Hills Police, where he lives. He says he was told to go home. When he called the North Richland Hills Police, the father says they were unable to help because the incident occurred in Dallas.
"The family was frustrated," Fortenberry explained. "After days of not getting any information from the Dallas Police Department and Dallas Police not taking any action, the family sought out the help of this agency in Houston.”
He says the family was able to find their daughter through the help of the human trafficking agency Texas Counter-Trafficking Initiative in Houston through the use of face-recognition technology.
“That agency was able to help them locate the photograph of their daughter online within the same day," Fortenberry added.
The Oklahoma City Police were able to rescue the girl and arrest eight people involved in the case.
Fortenberry said the Dallas police didn't even ask the father for a photograph of their daughter.
In response, the Dallas police said that they had searched the arena and sent the law enforcement code that explained their actions that night.
"Texas Family Code(51.03 b. 3) dictates that missing juveniles are investigated as runaways unless there are circumstances which appear as involuntary such as a kidnapping or abduction. Those cases per code are to be filed where the juvenile resides."
The North Richland Hills Police said that they had entered the information of the missing girl into the national missing person database within a few hours of receiving the report.
Fortenberry says they didn't do enough to save the girl and lessen the assault she received. "Any time she could have been rescued from that sooner would have been better," he added.
He also said that someone at the hotel ignored the signs of abuse when she was taken there.
"When a 40-something year old man walks in with a 15-year-old girl and rents multiple hotel rooms and then there is traffic coming in and out of those rooms, those are red flags," Fortenberry explained.
He also claims that the man was able to attend the game with a fake ticket sold to him by a person known for selling fake tickets.
The eight suspects were arrested on charges including human trafficking, distribution of child pornography, and rape.
I’d love to see the perps faces.....
Wow... that is an amazing story. Happy for the good ending.
I know of a case like this at the baseball park in San Diego where a guy was trying to get the girl to go with him. She did not leave the ball park with him, but he got away and was not found or arrested. She just happened to be older and more savvy than she looked. Also, she worked for the Padres so she knew what security people at the ballpark were normally like and this guy was not right.
she is 15....it does not matter if she wanted to go be a sex slave, if she did.......its a crime to entice, drug, engage, encourage, pay, or promise anything to basically a kid...
not saying this young girl was completely innocent, but she could have been given a drug....
Some people in this thread are blaming the girl since it should be hard to get kidnapped in a busy location.
These same people would ignore it if they witnessed a kidnapping in a busy location, because their minds would not compute that a kidnapping could happen there. And there would be too many other things happening to notice what was wrong.
The cops who made the same mistake should be better trained and should be as good as the private group that found the girl.
That is a likely scenario. They are probably pros at this.
horrific.
To those saying, “No way, she must have known the person she left with and gone willingly”, remember Elizabeth Smart? She was abducted right out of her own bedroom by people she had never even seen before, and she was later in crowded public areas with them, many times, but was too scared to try to ask anyone for help.
That’s exactly what I was thinking.
In response, the Dallas police said that they had searched the arena and sent the law enforcement code that explained their actions that night.
How can you search for a missing 15 year old girl without even asking for her picture?
The Cops are in on the program and assisting the perps.
More than half a million people were reported missing in 2021.
That is down from almost 1 million in the 1990’s!
Did a bit more research. That “missing” category counts runaways that come back home, turn up a few days later, etc. Something like 1 in 10,000 missing people turn up dead.
In 2021(?) there were about 4,700 kids that were abducted by strangers in the USA. 20% of them turned up dead. I’m not sure what the percentages were regarding returned home or never found.
I don’t see how the Mavericks or the stadium is responsible for this. The father should have gone with his 15-year-old daughter, and the police in that district should’ve taken the report and investigated the crime that took place on their turf.
Years ago, we had a 9 year old girl abducted when she strayed a minute from her mom at a local mall. The mom found Mall Security and they had a protocol in existence that called for all exits to immediately be shut and guarded. No kids allowed to leave without being checked. Adults only could go out.
Within 5 minutes the girl was found standing by an exit, alone, where she had been abandoned by the perp who just walked out the exit and left. The girl was dressed as a boy and had her hair cut.
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