Brazillian Girl Rescued from Abduction After Signaling Police with Blink
A 10-year-old girl abducted by her father in Brazil was rescued after blinking a distress signal to police. The father was arrested, and the child was safely reunited with her mother.
A 10-year-old girl allegedly abducted by her father in Brazil was rescued after managing to signal police officers by blinking that she was in distress. The officers noticed the girl and a man walking in heavy rain early in the morning in the city of Praia Grande, in Sao Paulo state, and stopped to check on them.
The father, Wellington Ferreira da Silva, was arrested, and a check revealed that an active arrest warrant had been issued against him. The girl was taken for medical treatment and later reunited with her mother, according to reports by the Colombian newspaper El Tiempo and the Brazilian newspaper Folha de S.Paulo.
The incident took place on October 7, but returned to the headlines after an award ceremony was held last Friday at the Military Police headquarters in Sao Paulo to honor the officers who participated in the rescue, where the girl met them again.
The Blink That Raised Suspicion
According to El Tiempo, military police officers were returning at dawn from handling another call when they spotted a man and a girl on Argentina Street in the Guilhermina neighborhood. The early hour, heavy rain, and the lack of open businesses in the area aroused their suspicions, and they led the two to a covered area. One of the officers asked the girl to blink if something was wrong, and she responded with a discreet eye movement.
According to Folha de S.Paulo, suspicion had arisen even earlier: one of the officers stated that he made eye contact with the girl and noticed she was blinking several times, prompting the team to turn around and stop the two for inspection. The father and daughter gave conflicting accounts, and the man attempted to flee but was caught and arrested.
Threats and Abduction
According to the Sao Paulo Public Security Secretariat, on September 20 the father surprised his former partner and their daughter on a street in Barueri, in the metropolitan area of Sao Paulo, and threatened the woman with a firearm. He allegedly took the two to a hotel, drugged and assaulted the mother, and fled with the child and her purse.
On September 28, a judge in Barueri ordered an urgent search for the child and her return to the mother, granted full custody to the mother, and suspended the father's visitation rights. The father now faces prosecution for abduction and deprivation of liberty.
