Victim Found Safe; Suspect Detained in Amber Alert Incident

BOULDER, Colo. – The Boulder Police Department found a 16-year-old victim who was involved in a possible kidnapping last night.

The incident began around 8:30 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 22, when officers received a call that a man had threatened the teenage girl, forced her into his vehicle and left the scene. Patrol officers and detectives immediately began to investigate, following up on several leads—including that the pair knew each other—and using our partnership with Flock to identify and find a possible suspect. Officers coordinated with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation to send out alerts and they initially put out a Missing and Endangered Alert at 11:46 p.m., added the suspect’s photo at 12:15 a.m. and then sent out the Amber Alert just after 6 a.m. today.

Boulder Police received numerous tips from the community and are grateful for those and the use of Flock technology, which helped detectives retrace the suspect’s movements on public roads and some of his last known locations, leading detectives to additional witnesses and ultimately finding the victim and suspect in the City of Thornton.

“We’re so thankful this young woman was found safe and unharmed after we received such a scary call initially,” Boulder Police Chief Steve Redfearn said. “Our officers and detectives worked tirelessly all night following up on every lead, from interviewing witnesses to using Flock cameras to determine where this suspect could be. We greatly appreciate both our partners at Thornton Police who helped us take the suspect into custody and our representatives at Flock who proactively reached out to us to ensure we could use all aspects of their platform to gather information that led us to this successful conclusion.”

Boulder Police are not identifying the victim at this time because she is a juvenile. She and her family have told us that they do not wish to speak to any members of the media at this time.

The suspect—Juan Manuel Bretado-Lopez, 19—was detained and transported to the police department. This investigation is ongoing while detectives conduct interviews and consult with the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office.

As in every criminal case, the suspect is presumed innocent unless or until proven guilty.

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