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Provo police are still looking for a suspect who tried to abduct a boy yesterday as he walked home from school.
The boy, who is in fifth grade, was walking home from school yesterday when he was approached by a stranger. Tonight the boy says it was the talk his parents had with him about stranger danger that kept him safe.
"It was very scary," the boy said.
We'll call the 10-year-old boy "Miles". He was walking home from Lakeview Elementary school in Provo yesterday when he was approached by a stranger who tried to get him to get in his car. "I went ahead of the other kids, ‘cause I was anxious to get home. And a light blue truck was there, and a man out of the passenger window, leaned out and said, ‘Your mom is in the hospital, we got to go to her right now,'" Miles said.
Lt. Todd Grossgebauer says the suspect pretty much used a line right from the DARE program.
"You always hear the one, 'You got any candy' or 'Your parents sent me to pick you up.' In this case, he used the comment that his mother was in the hospital," Grossgebauer said.
Miles and his family already agreed on a password if someone was authorized by his parents to pick him up. "I didn't believe him and I ran home as fast as I could, and after that my mom called the cops," he said.
Miles says he's been taught about how to deal with strangers for a long time and knew what to do. He said, "My parents have taught me not to, and I've learned that at school and from police officers that have come to school and talked about stranger safety."
His father, Jeff, said, "I just encourage parents to continue to talk to their children, even when they are restless and you feel like they don't get the message, they get the message!"
It's a message Miles plans to share with his classmates. "Stay safe, don't talk to strangers and stay in groups when you are walking," he said.
"The victim didn't get the license plate. But that's not to say that there wasn't another child out there or an adult in the area that saw the same vehicle or may have seen the plate," Grossgebauer said.
The suspect is described as a dark-skinned male of medium build. He's 20 to 30 years old with short, black, curly hair and a black mustache. He wore an earring in his right ear. He was wearing a black T-shirt with white lettering on the back and blue jeans.
Anyone with information that would be helpful is asked to call Detective Mansanarez at 852-7294 or Provo Police Department Dispatch at 852-6210.
E-mail: spenrod@ksl.com
E-mail: mrichards@ksl.com
