Investigators say one teen jumped from a moving car after a man drove them to a secluded street and demanded sexual favors.
LOS ANGELES, CA — Two girls escaped an attempted kidnapping in the North Hills area after police said a man persuaded them into his car, locked the doors, drove to a secluded cul-de-sac and forced one of them to jump from the moving vehicle to get away.
Police say the episode began as a ride offer near North Hills Community Park and quickly turned into a criminal investigation that now stretches across several streets in the San Fernando Valley. Detectives are asking residents and businesses to check cameras near the park, along Columbus Avenue and near Lemona Avenue as they work to identify a suspect they say is in his early 20s and may spend time in the area. The case matters because it involved two minors, a brief but dangerous confinement inside a car and an escape that police say happened only after the girls realized they were being taken somewhere other than the destination they had named.
According to investigators, the girls were first approached late Sunday afternoon near North Hills Community Park, close to Acre Street and Columbus Avenue. LAPD Detective Efren Gutierrez said the driver pulled up and offered them a ride, but they said no and kept walking. Several blocks later, Gutierrez said, the same man returned and made the offer again. They refused a second time. A third encounter came at Nordhoff Street and Columbus Avenue, where the driver again asked whether they needed a ride. This time, after the repeated contact, the girls got in. The car then headed eastbound. Instead of taking them where they asked to go, Gutierrez said, the driver turned toward a residential pocket near Sunburst Street and Lemona Avenue. “The girls were frightened,” the detective said, describing what police believe was the moment the ride became an abduction attempt.
Investigators say the man locked the doors once the girls were inside and drove to a cul-de-sac in the 8900 block of Lemona Avenue or nearby, depending on how officers described the location in public updates Tuesday. There, police said, he offered the girls money, alcohol and drugs and asked for sexual favors. One account from investigators said he exposed himself and unzipped his shorts. Gutierrez said one girl got out while the car was stopped. The younger girl, seated in the back, then jumped from the vehicle while it was moving. Both ran and screamed for help as the driver sped away. Police said neither girl suffered physical injuries. Officials have not publicly said whether the girls were examined by paramedics at the scene, who first called 911, or whether any bystanders saw the final moments of the escape. Authorities also have not released the exact route the car took between the park area and the cul-de-sac.
Some public accounts from the investigation differed slightly Tuesday on the younger girl’s age, with police descriptions listing the pair as 12 and 16 in some reports and 13 and 16 in another. What remained consistent across the official retellings was the broader sequence: repeated contact, entry into the car after several offers, a locked door, a drive to a quieter street and an escape under pressure. Detectives described the suspect as a Hispanic man or a man in his early 20s, with black hair, brown eyes, a weight of about 200 pounds and tattoos on both arms. He was last seen in an older four-door sedan. Police have not publicly identified the make, model or license plate, a sign that detectives may still be piecing together video and witness accounts to sharpen the description. They have also not said whether the car was registered in the neighborhood or captured on city traffic cameras.
The geography of the case helps explain why detectives focused their search on a tight part of the northwest Valley. North Hills Community Park sits in a busy residential area, but the streets police later identified lie farther into neighborhoods where traffic can thin out quickly by early evening. Investigators said the driver seemed familiar with the area and may frequent several nearby intersections, including Sepulveda Boulevard and Nordhoff Street, Nordhoff Street and Columbus Avenue, Sunburst Street and Lemona Avenue, and the park itself. That pattern suggests officers are treating the route not as random turns but as a path possibly chosen by someone who knew where he could pull over with little interruption. Police have not said whether the suspect had any prior connection to the girls, whether he had been seen near the park before Sunday or whether similar reports from the same area are under review.
The case is being investigated as a kidnapping, though authorities have publicly used both “kidnapping” and “attempted kidnapping” in early reports as detectives worked through the timeline. No arrest had been announced by Tuesday evening, March 17. Investigators were still seeking surveillance footage from homes and businesses near the park and the residential streets where the girls escaped. Police asked people with information to contact Mission Area detectives or provide anonymous tips through Crime Stoppers. Authorities did not say Tuesday whether prosecutors had reviewed the case, whether any specific charges were being prepared or whether forensic evidence was recovered from the scene where the car stopped. The next likely steps are familiar in cases built from brief encounters: reconstructing the route block by block, identifying the sedan on video, comparing witness statements and determining whether the suspect’s description matches any prior reports involving minors approached near parks or busier corners in the surrounding neighborhood.
Even in a city used to hard crime news, the details left a sharp impression because of how narrow the escape appeared to be. The girls had already turned down the driver twice, according to police, before getting into the car on the third approach. That detail has become central to the case because it marks the point when repeated contact shifted from unwanted attention to confinement. Gutierrez said the neighborhood near Sunburst and Lemona was “secluded enough” that there were not many people or cars nearby. Yet the girls still found a way out. One climbed from the car while it was stopped. The other bailed out while it was moving. Police have not said how fast the sedan was traveling, how far the younger girl fell or whether nearby residents heard the screams before the vehicle fled. What officials have stressed is that both girls escaped, both were alive and unhurt, and the suspect remained free at the end of the day.
The investigation stood Tuesday night at a familiar but urgent stage: a detailed public appeal before an arrest, with detectives trying to turn a short list of locations and a rough vehicle description into a name. The next milestone is expected to be either the release of a clearer suspect image or an update from Mission Division detectives after they review surveillance footage from Sunday’s route.
Author note: Last updated March 17, 2026.