Missing Pueblo Girl Found Safe In Colorado Springs
An Amber Alert, the stubbornness of a young victim and the involvement of two men may have combined to save the life of 9-year-old Pueblo girl..
Police found the girl at about 9 a.m. Friday at the Circle K convenience store near Interstate 25 and Woodmen Road. Police said she phoned them after Jose Garcia, the man suspected of abducting her, fled from the store on foot. He was later arrested downtown.
Two Pueblo men, Daniel Espinoza and Efren Vialpando, said they entered the store on their way to a landscaping job and recognized the girl and Garcia inside. The men said they saw facial bruises on her that “raised a red flag.”
“When she looked at me, I was kind of like, stopped,” said Vialpando. “She looked at me, right in my eyes. That’s when she looked at the guy. She said she wasn’t going anywhere, she was waiting right there for her mama. And when that happened, I looked at the guy she was talking to. I looked up and I looked him dead in the eyes, and that’s when he just spun around and just cut out.”
“I recognized her backpack and her shirt because I went to the same school,” said Espinoza. “She had two black eyes, a bruised lip and a bruise on her cheek.”
Vialpando shook his head in disbelief. “I have two girls. There’s no words for something like that,” he said.
Four schools in the area were on “secured perimeter” status, according to School District 20, but that was lifted after Garcia’s arrest.
An Amber Alert was issued early Friday morning for the girl after she didn’t come home from Colombian Elementary School on Thursday. Police issued the alert just after 3 a.m.
“Time is of the essence,” said Colorado Springs police spokeswoman Barbara Miller. “When you see an alert, everyone needs to be looking for that child. This is a great case where the child was found alive and safe.”
A witness initially told police that the girl got into a white passenger car, possibly a white Mercedes. On Friday, police said she and Garcia were in a pickup truck that broke down near the store, and that a passerby took them to the store.
Police said the truck had flat tires and appeared to have been in a crash.
