A Good Samaritan in California helped stop a kidnapper, who federal authorities say kidnapped a teenager, 13, and drove her thousands of miles from Texas to California.
The dramatic arrest was made on July 9 in Long Beach, three days after the teenager in San Antonio, Texas was kidnapped at gunpoint.
Prosecutors say the victim was able to get the Good Samaritan’s attention by making a ‘Help Me!’ sign on a crumpled piece of paper.
Steven Robert Sablan, 61, was arrested and charged with charged with kidnapping and transportation of a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity.
He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.
The victim was only identified as a 13-year-old Hispanic female from San Antonio. Her mother reported her missing on July 6.
She believed her daughter left home to attempt to visit a school friend who had moved to Australia the year before.
According to the indictment, the kidnapper approached the victim the same day as she was walking down the street in San Antonio.
Sablan approached her in his car, then raised a black handgun to his side.
‘If you don’t get in the car with me, I’m going to hurt you,’ Sablan allegedly told the teenage victim.
Inside the car, Sablan promised the victim that he could take her to visit her friend in Australia.
However, ‘she would need to do something for him if he was going to do something for her.’
Sablan then proceeded to sexually assault the victim, despite her repeatedly telling him to stop. The indictment alleges he assaulted her at least 10 times.
The kidnapper then drove the teenager across Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, until arriving in California.
Sablan assaulted the victim at least two more times during the cross-country trip.
On July 9, Sablan and the victim arrived in Long Beach, California. He instructed her to change clothes, then went inside a laundromat to do their laundry.
‘While SABLAN was in the laundromat, Minor Victim stayed in the vehicle and wrote “help me” on a piece of note paper to try and get someone’s attention,’ the indictment reads.
A Good Samaritan saw the victim’s note and immediately called the police.
Touch Vong, one of the laundromat’s employees, told ABC7 she noticed Sablan and the victim and sensed something was wrong.
Vong said she sensed something was wrong, and encouraged him to wait at the laundromat until police arrived.
‘I feel like God told me to stop him,’ Vong said.
Police in Long Beach arrived to find the victim sitting in the front seat of Sablan’s car, while the kidnapper stood outside.
While officers spoke to Sablan, they noticed the victim mouth the world ‘help’ inside the car.
They quickly realized there was an arrest warrant out for Sablan for burglary in Fort Worth, Texas.
The arrest warrant also said he should be considered ‘armed and dangerous.’
After Sablan was placed under arrest, they found a set of handcuffs on his body and his black BB handgun under the driver’s seat.
Sablan has a lengthy criminal history, including two convictions for robbery with a deadly weapon from 1979 and 1985, and a conviction for possession of a controlled substance in 2016.
