Family counting blessings that 5-year-old is safe after kidnapping in Minneapolis
The family of five-year-old Kevin is glad he is back home, safe and sound, after Tuesday's incident. (FOX 9)
MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) - When a family in Minneapolis stopped this week to help at a crash scene they ended up enduring a horrifying ordeal themselves after someone stole their minivan with their five-year-old boy in the back seat.
Jose Trejo says when the carjacker took off with his son, he was dragged for a block trying to open the doors or break the windshield on his minivan. Through a family member who translated, he told us his family is counting its blessings that their youngest of six children made it home alive.
"[We] are thankful for now that [we] actually got Kevin back," Jose said.
Like a lot of five year olds, Kevin Trejo enjoys playing with toy cars. But his parents aren't sure how he feels about the real thing after being taken on the ride of his life against his will.
"He's not the same kid that he was," said mother Obdulea Coba, with help from a translator. "Normally he likes to go outside. Now he's like 'don't leave me by myself.'"
Kevin and his parents were on their way to go grocery shopping when they stopped to help the victims of an accident near 26th and Lyndale Tuesday afternoon. But after Jose Trejo and Obdulea Coba got out of their minivan, the driver who caused the crash jumped in the front seat and took off with Kevin still inside.
"He was scared for Kevin because he heard Kevin yelling when he saw the guy jump in the car," the translator explained on behalf of Jose. "He saw him trying to open the doors and he wasn't able to."
"She just kept praying to God to bring him back safe," added Obdulea. "She was just thinking what is he going to do. He's crazy. He's going to crash the car with Kevin in there. Kevin is not going to come back alive."
For the next 2.5 hours, Trejo and Coba waited as police tracked the GPS on the phone Trejo had left in the vehicle. Officers eventually found the minivan ditched in south Minneapolis with Kevin in the backseat with a few bumps and bruises from the carjacker driving erratically.
"What Kevin was explaining to us was that the guy was driving like crazy," his mother said. "He actually said the guy is crazy."
After their ordeal, Kevin's family is just grateful their New Year ended up being a happy one.
"She said it was a horrible experience to go through that," the translator said for Obdulea. "Thankfully the New Year she got to see her family all complete."
Trejo says his family hasn't gotten their minivan back yet because it is evidence. Minneapolis police say they have identified who the carjacker is and are working to make an arrest.