Police are searching for the suspect who allegedly kidnapped a nine-year-old girl from a Queens Village convenience store and then sexually assaulted her in his Honda Civic Thursday night.
Photo courtesy of NYPD
A manhunt is underway in southeast Queens for a sex offender who is believed to have kidnapped a nine-year-old girl from a Queens Village supermarket on Thursday evening while she was shopping with her grandmother.
The abduction occurred shortly after 7:20 p.m. at the Key Food store at 213-22 Jamaica Avenue as the grandmother went to the restroom. The sex offender approached the juvenile and lured her out of the store and into his vehicle, according to a law enforcement source familiar with the investigation.
While the grandmother informed the store employees about her granddaughter's disappearance, the perpetrator led her into a silver four-door Honda Civic sedan, drove away from the scene and drove a short distance.
What happened next led to calls on social media for street justice against the suspected kidnapper, who parked the Civic and then forced the young girl to perform an indecent act in the vehicle, police said.
After the sexual assault, the suspect drove back to the Queens Village Key Food and let her go before driving off in an unknown direction. The victim was reunited with her grandmother before EMS took the victim to a local hospital for evaluation. An NYPD spokesperson could not say which hospital the victim was taken to.
The NYPD has released a surveillance photo of the suspect and is asking the public for help in identifying him. He is described as having a dark complexion and heavyset build. He was last seen wearing a pink polo shirt, a blue MTA baseball cap, clear-framed glasses and blue jeans. A reward of up to $3,500 is being offered for information leading to the arrest of the suspected perpetrator.
On Friday around 10 a.m., the NYPD released a surveillance image of the Honda Civic that the perpetrator was driving.
Investigators believe the same car was involved in a fatal crash in Queens Village around 12:30 p.m. Friday and are trying to determine if the driver is the same man wanted for the kidnapping at the Key Food store less than a mile from the crash scene. The driver of the silver Honda Civic was speeding north on 90th Avenue when he sideswiped a Grand Cherokee at the intersection with 212th Street. Emergency medical services arrived at the scene and took the driver of the Honda Civic to NewYork-Presbyterian Queens Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
The driver of the Grand Cherokee remained at the scene and was not injured. No arrests have been made and the investigation is ongoing.
Anyone with information regarding this kidnapping investigation is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). The public can also submit their tips by visiting the Crime Stoppers website at crimestoppers.nypdonline.orgor on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter) @NYPDTips. All calls and messages will be kept confidential.
As of Aug. 25, the 105th Precinct, where the crime occurred, has reported 37 sex crimes so far in 2024, seven more than the 30 reported at the same time last year, a 23.3% increase, according to the latest CompStat report.
