Kidnapped 6-year-old rescued by Kansas trooper during traffic stop
(Mike Hutmacher/Wichita Eagle/Tribune News Service via Getty Images
(KANSAS) — One traffic violation on a Kansas highway led to the miraculous rescue of a 6-year-old girl who had been kidnapped.
Kansas Highway Patrol said the rescue happened after a highway trooper stopped an SUV for a traffic violation last month.
During the traffic stop, the trooper discovered that the front-seat passenger had a warrant for his arrest from another state for kidnapping a 6-year-old girl just over a month earlier, officials said in a post on Facebook.
Kansas Highway Patrol said the trooper had observed a girl in the vehicle about that age riding with the two adult male occupants, both of whom were in their 60s.
Officials said the driver of the vehicle had a criminal history that included homicide and numerous weapons violations.
“After the trooper and a deputy from a local sheriff’s office quickly secured both the driver and passenger, the trooper safely removed the little girl from the vehicle,” Kansas Highway Patrol wrote in the post.
Officials said initially the 6-year-old girl gave the trooper a false name and date of birth “after having been coached to do so, in an attempt to keep the adult out of jail.”
The young girl eventually told the trooper her real name when it was confirmed she was the kidnapping victim who had been with the suspect for over a month, officials said.
“Thankfully the girl was unharmed, and the men were taken into custody,” officials added.
The identities of those involved have not yet been released.
ABC News has reached out to the Kansas Highway Patrol for comment.
(MIAMI) — A couple was arrested after allegedly attempting to board an American Airlines flight without authorization, leading to a physical altercation in which one individual allegedly threw coffee on an airline staff member, police said.
The incident occurred on Sunday at Miami International Airport as passengers were preparing to board American Airlines flight 2494 traveling from Miami to Cancún.
Rafael Seirafe-Novaes and Beatriz Rapoport-De-Campos-Maia “ignored the signs and verbal commands from the ticket agent” and allegedly pushed past the agent and others to enter the jet bridge, according to a police report from the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office.
According to the report, the couple “were denied boarding and became irate at which time they pushed the two victims,” and Rapoport-De-Campos-Maia allegedly “threw coffee on them.”
American Airlines said in a statement to ABC News: “Acts of violence are not tolerated by American Airlines and we are committed to working closely with law enforcement in their investigation.”
Rapoport-De-Campos-Maia and Seirafe-Novaes have each been charged with two counts of battery and one count each of trespassing on property after warning, police said. Seirafe-Novaes has also been charged with one count of resisting an officer without violence to his person, as he pulled his arms away from the arresting officer, per the police report.
The couple was taken into custody and transported to the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center in Miami, according to the police report.
It was unclear if either has an attorney who can speak on their behalf.
The only man ever charged in the notorious Las Vegas murder of rapper Tupac Shakur insists he is “innocent,” being railroaded by authorities and that he only confessed to his purported role in the crime because he was getting paid to lie.
In his first interview since being arrested in September 2023, Duane “Keffe D” Davis told ABC News in a jailhouse interview that he should be at home, watching his grandchildren grow up and tending to his garden. Instead, he said, he’s being forced to stand trial in a nearly three-decade-old case that’s devoid of concrete evidence.
“I’m innocent,” Davis said during a sometimes-tearful hour-long meeting at the Clark County Detention Center. He described himself as a “good man” long retired from the drug game he once excelled at.
“I did everything they asked me to do. Get new friends. Stop selling drugs. I stopped all that,” he said, referring to police and prosecutors. “I’m supposed to be out there enjoying my twilight at one of my f—— grandson’s football games, and basketball games. Enjoying life with my kids.”
Prosecutors say Davis, 61, was a longtime member and leader of a set of the infamous Crips street gang based in his hometown of Compton, California. Authorities say that, as the alleged “shot caller” on the night of Shakur’s killing in September 1996, it was Davis who orchestrated the drive-by shooting of the rap star off the Vegas strip. On their way from Mike Tyson’s fight against Bruce Seldon, Shakur was gunned down at a red light in the passenger seat of the BMW being driven by rap impresario Marion “Suge” Knight. Shakur was rushed to the hospital and died six days later from his wounds.
Though the killing occurred on the bustling streets of Sin City – it remained unsolved for nearly 30 years, mired in police scandals and turf wars, and a street code that frowns upon snitches.
Eventually, Vegas detectives built their case off Davis’ own account of the killing, retold in multiple police interviews, public media appearances before his arrest, and a 2019 self-published memoir with his own name on it.
Davis’ previous words copping to his role in the rapper’s killing are crucial in the case against him. Investigators say they spent years working to beef up Davis’ narrative of the events by using evidence and additional accounts to firm up their case – expected to be presented to a jury in 11 months.
Davis, sitting on a wooden bench under the harsh fluorescent lights of a jailhouse conference room and accompanied by corrections officers, now insists he didn’t write his own memoir – and hasn’t even read it. And so, he says, those confessions aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on.
“I’ve never read the book,” Davis said of his memoir “Compton Street Legend,” on which he shares the credit as a co-author. The back of the book bears the tagline, “The last living eyewitness to Tupac’s murder is telling his story.”
Davis says his co-author took artistic liberties he had nothing to do with.
“I just gave him details of my life,” Davis said. “And he went and did his little investigation and wrote the book on his own.”
Not only does he say he had nothing to do with Shakur’s killing, Davis said he was hundreds of miles away from where it happened – asserting for the first time where he says he was that night: “in Los Angeles,” and at home.
Davis said he has “about 20 or 30 people going to come” to his murder trial corroborating that alibi – to say nothing of the “13,000 people who say they killed Tupac.” He did not name the people who he said woukld verify where he was the night that Shakur was killed.
“I did not do it,” Davis said of what had stood as one of the best-known cold cases in modern American history. Of prosecutors leading the case against him, he said “They don’t have nothing. And they know they don’t have nothing. They can’t even place me out here. They don’t have no gun, no car, no Keffe D, no nothing.”
Las Vegas prosecutors declined to respond directly to Davis’ comments but continue to insist they are confident in the case and expect to see the man convicted at trial.
In 2008, Davis confessed to his purported role in the Shakur homicide in an interview with detectives connected to a joint federal-Los Angeles task force that had set up a drug operation sting on Davis to extract information on fellow rap icon Biggie Smalls’ murder, which happened six months after Shakur’s. Davis at the time said he didn’t have information about Biggie’s murder — but did have other information that would be valuable. That time, according to police, Davis made his admissions as part of what’s known as a “proffer agreement,” so he could not be prosecuted for what he said.
The following year, Davis again confirmed his purported role in the Shakur drive-by this time in an interview with detectives from Las Vegas. Vegas authorities were not connected to the earlier sessions, and were not required to honor any agreement that might have been made with Davis, according to interview recordings and transcripts reviewed by ABC. The only thing Vegas cops agreed to was that the interview with Davis would be voluntary and he would not be arrested on the spot.
At the time, some Las Vegas detectives wanted to bust Davis and charge him with the Tupac murder, but prosecutors feared that both sets of alleged confessions could be thrown out of court because of the purported non-prosecution agreement in LA. If a judge were to side with Davis, the case would likely have been doomed.
Davis’ lawyers did make that argument earlier this year and the judge rejected it. But the issue was largely beside the point because, officials have said, Davis went on to publicly recount his purported role in the homicide repeatedly in the years since 2009, especially in a 2018 docuseries and on the pages of “Compton Street Legends.”
Davis’ own public words “reinvigorates the investigation,” the now-retired head of the Las Vegas homicide bureau, Jason Johansson, told ABC last year.
Sitting in jail, Davis said that version of events was totally fabricated for profit when he told his story in the media. As for making his purported confession to the authorities, he said, that was a play to keep others caught up in a drug case out of prison. He said he told police what they wanted to hear “if they let me go.”
“That’s the only way you’re walking free,” Davis said, recounting the choice he felt he had to make. “It would’ve been selfish to let everybody go down because of me.”
As for the similar versions of events recounted by him on camera, before his arrest, and in the book with his name on it, Davis says that was just a financial investment.
“They paid me to say that,” he said.
Davis insists the 2008 non-prosecution agreement should still hold and that any statements to law enforcement connected with it should not be presented to the jury next year.
“I’m not even supposed to be in jail,” he said. “A deal is a deal.”
Davis also pointed the finger at an altogether different suspect: the former cop responsible for running some of the security operations for Knight and Shakur on the night of the shooting. That man, Reggie Wright Jr., a former Compton police officer, who testified before the grand jury that indicted Davis for the Shakur killing, ran security for Knight’s Death Row Records back in the mid-1990s. Wright has said he spent most of that night of the killing working out logistics at the club that Shakur and Knight were planning to visit after the Tyson fight.
Echoing a recent accusation lodged in court papers by his attorney, Davis now accuses Wright and his security team of having orchestrated the shooting that killed Shakur.
“Prove that I orchestrated this,” Davis said. “Their top witness is the lead suspect, Reggie Wright Jr.,” alleging both Wright and his onetime security company were “mercenaries.”
Wright has denied any involvement in Shakur’s killing – and points out he was there for exactly the opposite purpose that night.
“I was in charge of possibly protecting this young man,” Wright told ABC’s Nightline last year.
“It’s heartbreaking they keep dragging in my name,” Wright said reacting to Davis’ attorney’s recent allegations. “I didn’t have anything to do with that. One of the worst days of my life when I heard that that happened.”
Davis has repeatedly tried to make bail since he was arrested outside his home in Sept. 2023 but the judge refused to accept the financing packages he has put together. He now faces an additional charge and trial connected with a jailhouse fight with another inmate, set for April.
According to jailhouse surveillance footage obtained by ABC News, the man who fought with Davis appeared to have been waiting alone and unattended in a common area when Davis came walking through with an escort. The second inmate can be seen lunging at Davis, who fought back.
Both Davis and the other inmate have pleaded not guilty to charges of battery and challenging each other to fight. Davis said he was only defending himself. He has also pleaded not guilty to the murder charge.
He insists that he will eventually beat the rap on both the murder and battery charge and that he knows how to fight his way through.
“God got my back, and God will see me through this,” Davis said. “He had my back with cancer, I survived the streets, and the FBI. That’s a big accomplishment for a man from Compton.”
ABC News’ Kaitlyn Morris contributed to this report.
(COCOA BEACH, FL) — An elementary school principal has been arrested after allegedly throwing a massive boozy house party for over 100 juveniles, authorities said.
The incident occurred on Jan. 19 when authorities from the Cocoa Beach Police Department responded to a home after reports of a large house party and “observed over 100 juveniles at the residence in matching t-shirts, many of whom were consuming alcohol that was later learned to be available in coolers at the residence,” according to a statement from the Cocoa Beach Police Department.
The homeowner was quickly identified to be Elizabeth Hill-Brodigan, the principal of nearby Roosevelt Elementary School, police said.
“While officers were investigating the party, a juvenile was located on the front lawn experiencing an alcohol related medical event,” authorities said in their statement regarding the party. “The juvenile was so heavily intoxicated that Brevard County Fire Rescue (BCFR) had to respond to treat them.”
“During this time, the homeowner, Hill-Brodigan, was seen by officers in the driveway of her residence turning off the outside lights and entering her residence, causing BCFR to auxiliary lighting on their vehicle to treat the juvenile,” police continued. “Additionally, a traffic stop was conducted near the residence resulting in the arrest of the juvenile driver for DUI.”
Another intoxicated adult female — later identified as Karly Anderson, a teacher at Roosevelt Elementary School — was also identified as being at the party, according to the Cocoa Beach Police Department.
Numerous juveniles and their parents were interviewed by police in the days after the incident and an arrest was obtained for Hill-Brodigan on charges of child neglect, contributing to the delinquency of a minor and holding an open house party, police said.
Anderson was also arrested and charged with child neglect and contributing to the delinquency of a minor.
The school has yet to issue a statement regarding the party and the investigation remains open.
