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WEST VALLEY CITY — A Kearns man is facing several criminal charges after police say he tried to kidnap a 13-year-old girl until her mother intervened.
Miguel Angel Vega Sedano, 21, was charged Tuesday in 3rd District Court with attempted child kidnapping, a first-degree felony; and two counts of possessing someone else's identification, a class A misdemeanor.
On March 3, a mother found Instagram messages between her 13-year-old daughter and Sedano. Sedano was sending messages to the young girl "about roses, chocolates, and meeting up," according to charging documents. Sedano also allegedly told the girl to delete his messages after receiving them.
The mother then sent Sedano a message on Instagram saying her daughter was only 13 and that he needed to stop sending her messages, then blocked Sedano's account, the charges state.
But on March 7, the mother checked her daughter's phone again and said she discovered that Sedano had created a new account. He sent the young girl messages stating that "he had gotten a job so he could take care of her and offered to pick (her) up from school and leave with her in his vehicle," according to the charges.
On Friday, a West Valley police officer who was working with the FBI Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking task force went to a junior high school in the Granite School District where Sedano was located and arrested him.
"He admitted to going to pick up (the girl) and that he understood her to be 13 years old," prosecutors stated in charging documents.
Sedano allegedly told investigators he came to the U.S. from Peru illegally in 2021. When he was arrested, police say he was carrying a Social Security card and U.S. Permanent Resident Card that belonged to someone else.
