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PROVO, Utah (AP) -- The man accused of kidnapping a Mapleton boy has been charged with attempted murder in a 2002 hit-and-run case.
The charge against Robert Allen Kartchner, 20, was filed Wednesday in 4th District Court.
The Orem man is awaiting a competency evaluation at the Utah State Hospital in the kidnapping case.
Family members of Spencer Bradford are relieved that the charge has been filed.
"For a long time Spencer would look over his shoulder," said Catherine Jungheim, Bradford's older sister.
On Aug. 22, 2002, a car struck Bradford while the Mapleton youth was walking home from his piano lesson. No witnesses saw it, Mapleton detective Reyna Cameron said.
Bradford, who was 14 at the time, said the car had passed by several times. Bradford moved off the road and was nearly six feet from the street when the car struck him.
He was hit near his knees and knocked to the ground. The boy suffered spinal injuries as well as bruises and abrasions.
The boy was able to read three numbers on the car's license plate, which police say linked Kartchner to the incident.
Kartchner also faces two recently filed charges of child kidnapping and attempted child kidnapping. The new charges relate to incidents on June 18, 2002, and March 4 in Provo and will be part of a single case against Kartchner that will include the Oct. 9 abduction of a 5-year-old Mapleton boy.
The victim in the Oct. 9 abduction was riding his scooter home from school, when he was grabbed and taken 15 miles to the Diamond Fork area of Spanish Fork Canyon. There the abductor slowly cut the boy's arm, neck and thigh. Investigators said the assailant choked the boy with the remains of a T-shirt and then threw the child into the bushes and drove off. The boy was found by workers. Kartchner was arrested when he drove through the Diamond Fork area several hours later.
(Copyright 2003 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
