(PatriotWise.com) — State Police in New York last Monday rescued the 9-year-old who went missing last weekend while on a camping trip with family, the Associated Press reported.
The 9-year-old girl who went missing last Saturday while camping with family in a New York park was found Monday evening alive and well.
Charlotte Sena, who vanished while riding her bike on one of the loops in a heavily wooded area of Moreau Lake State Park in Upstate New York on Saturday evening just before dinner time, was “safe and in good health” and her abductor is behind bars, New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced in a press conference last Monday evening.
Governor Hochul said police identified Charlotte’s kidnapper, 47-year-old Craig Nelson Ross Jr., from a fingerprint pulled from a ransom note left at David and Trisha Sena’s home.
State police surveilled the Sena’s home while the family remained at the park, the governor said. At around four in the morning last Monday, police watched someone drop something in the mailbox that turned out to be the ransom note.
The police pulled prints from the ransom note, one of which matched Craig Ross, whose prints were on file from a 1999 DWI case.
After linking Ross to a property owned by his mother, police and SWAT teams raided the property at about 6:30 p.m. last Monday. Ross was found hiding in a camper parked in the back.
The suspect was taken into custody, and police found Charlotte hidden in a cabinet.
While Charlotte appeared to be unharmed, she was transported to a nearby hospital to be checked out before being reunited with her family.
In a statement last Tuesday, David and Trisha Sena said they were “thrilled” their daughter was safe and said that is not always the outcome when a child is abducted, the Associated Press reported.
In an interview on Law & Crime’s Sidebar podcast last week, former FBI and CIA agent Tracy Walder said the decision to place surveillance on the Senas’ home was “excellent police work” that led them to the fingerprint that “ultimately cracked the case.”
Ross was arraigned Monday night in Milton Town Court on the charge of first-degree kidnapping and taken to the Saratoga County Correctional Facility, where he is being held without bail.
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