The 16-year-old girl who was found Tuesday after being kidnapped in the Bronx reportedly admitted to authorities that she had staged the “crime” with friends.
Karol Sanchez was caught on surveillance video being “forced” into a car in front of her terrified mother Monday, prompting an Amber Alert and national headlines.
“It was staged,” a police source told the New York Daily News.
“Once they realized what they did, with the amber alert on their phones, it was like, ’Oh, s—t, we got a problem,’ ” the source told the Daily News.
Ms. Sanchez turned up again Tuesday afternoon on Eagle Avenue and East 156th Street, the scene of Monday evening’s seizure.
In a surveillance-video clip that went viral, the four men grabbed Ms. Sanchez and put her inside a beige sedan and shoved her screaming mother onto the ground.
The four “kidnappers” were in their 20s and, according to the Daily News, friends of Ms. Sanchez.
According to the police source, Ms. Sanchez staged the incident to get away from a mother whom she thought was too strict.
The mother, a Honduras native, wanted to move the family back there and the daughter didn’t want to go, police told the Daily News.
There was no immediate word on whether or what charges would be filed against Ms. Sanchez or the four “attackers.”
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
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