MIDDLETOWN, Ohio — Middletown police said Monday that they are on the lookout for a pair of men who tried to lure two young girls into a van outside of an apartment complex.
Around 9:30 p.m. Sunday, 10-year-old Faith Barnett and her neighbor, 7-year-old Jaymi Williams, were playing outside, according to Jaymi's grandmother, when a greenish-gray van approached them.
“He kept saying, ‘Come here, come here,’” Faith said.
“We didn’t see the man in the passenger seat that good,” Jaymi said. “But we saw the guy that was driving. He had spiky hair.”
Both girls ran away screaming, and they said the van took off.
When the girls told her what had happened, Faith's grandmother Beverly Barnett rushed outside to see if she could find the van to write down its license plate number, but it was already gone.
“It’s a shame children can’t go out and play without having parents and grandparents having to worry about this,” said Barnett.
Officers were briefed on the situation and spent the night canvassing, according to Middletown police, but did not locate the suspects or their vehicle.
“I have goosebumps now thinking of it, and I didn’t sleep well last night at all,” said Jaymi’s grandmother Lisa Barr. “I’m angry, and I hope Middletown police catch these people.