(RepublicanNews.org) – Thanks to a ransom note carelessly covered in fingerprints, an abducted little girl is now safe. Charlotte Sena, 9, was reportedly snatched up by her then-unknown abductor while she was riding her bike on September 30th in New York’s Moreau Lake State Park. Her whereabouts and condition could only be speculated upon for the next two days.
The location of her upstate abduction is not an area that is particularly prone to crime, according to a friend of her family. Patrick Kane told reporters that “this stuff never happens here.” His comments were made before Charlotte had been found and he was adamant at the time that she would be “coming back home.”
Two days after she was taken, State Police in New York announced that they had simultaneously both found Charlotte alive and taken her suspected abductor into custody. According to authorities, the man in question had inadvertently left his biometrics on a ransom note he delivered to the Sena family home.
Police were reportedly surveilling the home with the hope it would yield a positive development. Officials said that in the wee hours of October 2nd, a man approached the Sena mailbox and dropped an item inside it. After checking the box, they found the item to be a demand for ransom.
Though police have not indicated the specifics of the ransom demand, forensics were able to pull a fingerprint off the piece of paper. The garnered print led authorities to the records of a 1999 arrest in which a local 47-year-old named Craig Nelson Ross Jr. had been charged with DWI.
It is not clear if police followed him after he delivered his note, or if his location was later found by cross-checking family addresses. What is known is that about 10 hours later, tactical units stormed the RV Ross was staying in behind his mother’s residence.
After a brief struggle, he was arrested. Charlotte was found safely stashed in a cabinet.
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