A 17-year-old boy who was kidnapped and held for ransom for days was found on Friday following a series of threatening phone calls to the victim's family, according to authorities.
The boy was abducted on Monday and driven from San Bernardino County to Santa Maria. For days, the teen’s mother received a string of disturbing calls and text messages demanding money and threatening to cut off parts of her son’s body if she didn’t comply.
Three men are now in federal custody, facing kidnapping charges.
According to the federal complaint, the 17-year-old was driving in Highland on Monday morning when the men caused him to crash into their SUV. When the teen got out of his car, two of them men forced him into their SUV and took off.
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That afternoon, the boy's mother in California received a phone call from a Mexican number demanding she deliver a half million dollars to Nogales, Mexico to secure his return.
She then received a video of her son reading from a script saying that the abduction was his father’s fault for an incident that happened in New York.
More calls followed, threatening to cut off her son’s body parts if she didn’t make the payment.
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“It was hell, as you can imagine, any parent that would have to go through something like that. Knowing your son has been abducted. Knowing your son is being held by people with bad intent. And knowing that those people are threatening your son with bodily harm unless you pay them a huge ransom,” U.S. attorney Martin Estrada said.
FBI agents along with the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Department and Santa Maria Police Department tracked down the suspected kidnappers to a Motel 6 in Santa Maria. Estrada said they found the three men inside along with a firearm and the 17-year-old boy.
Investigators said they used Facebook Marketplace to track down the SUV and found it had just entered the U.S. the day before the alleged kidnapping.
The teenager was unharmed and reunited with his family.
The three men are expected to appear before a judge in U.S. district court in downtown Los Angeles on Monday.
If convicted on federal kidnapping charges, they could face a maximum sentence of life in prison.
