Pizza Helps Police Find Kidnap Suspect

June 10, 2003 -- The description of a house and a pepperoni pizza delivery from Little Caesar's provided by a 9-year-old girl kidnapped from her home led to her alleged abductor's arrest, authorities said today.

Authorities said the suspect, identified as David Montiel Cruz, 24, faces nine counts of kidnapping, sexual assault, burglary, robbery and assault with a deadly weapon. He was scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday afternoon.

If convicted of all the charges, Cruz could be sentenced to life in prison, Deputy District Attorney Matt Braker said.

The girl was abducted Friday after she returned home from school.

The Pepperoni Trail

Cruz was arrested in a predawn raid Monday at the home of a friend — less than a mile from the victim's San Jose home, police said. The capture came eight hours after the girl was released. She walked into a convenience store Sunday night and asked for help.

Police said today it was the girl herself who gave them the information they needed to track down the suspect.

"To go through what she went through and to know that she was so terrorized when she first went into that market to try and get help, and be able to take a 180-degree turn from that and help those detectives immediately upon contact with her, to give them the key pieces of information that they needed was remarkable," San Jose police Deputy Chief Rob Davis said today on ABCNEWS' Good Morning America. "We could not have asked more from her. [She's] just a remarkable young woman."

Davis said information the girl gave police very soon after her release helped them locate the house where she was held, and her memory of the suspect ordering a pepperoni pizza from Little Caesar's allowed them to confirm their suspicions.

"There are a couple of things she did," Davis said. "She had a very good description that she could provide us of the house itself. And she did this within moments after we made contact with her, so that was one key piece that helped lead us to the actual house.

"We also learned that the suspect had ordered some pizza and we were able to backtrack through the pizza companies as to confirm the suspect's location," he added. "Mostly it was the young girl's description of the house that led us to the residence. The pizza issue was something that helped us confirm where the suspect was at a certain time as well as confirm that they were there together."

The man who delivered the pizza was taking part in the national Amber Alert program that had been activated to try to find the kidnapped girl. He said he advised Cruz to be on the lookout for the missing child when he handed him the pizza.

"The odd thing is that actually we were passing out the flier with our deliveries and so I handed him a flier saying this littlegirl is missing," deliveryman Lamar Cox said on Good Morning America.

Kidnapper Lay in Wait

Davis said he could not give any details about how the girl got free from her captor, except to say she was released.

"We know that most likely he was starting to feel the heat and pressure from the media, as well as the fact that I think that some of the things that the girl said to him may have played a key role in getting him to release her," he said.

The child was dragged from her home Friday, as she returned home from school. Video from a neighbor's surveillance camera showed the abductor had been lying in wait for nearly two hours.

Once inside the home, the kidnapper fought with the girl's mother and her 15-year-old brother, police said. Both were severely injured, and they were unable to stop the man from leaving with the girl, police said.

Cruz fits the description given by the the mother and brother, police said. The suspect also has injuries that match those the girl's mother said she inflicted on the kidnapper, and has a vehicle that looks like the one the kidnapper was seen driving in the neighbor's surveillance video, authorities said.

‘She Was Just Remarkable’

The kidnapping was apparently not a random act. Police said Cruz may have seen the victim before, when she played with his girlfriend's twin 11-year-old daughters, perhaps even at the house where she was allegedly held.

There is also some confusion about Cruz's real name. He was also booked into jail under the name Enrique Sosa Alvarez. Police were also checking on other possible aliases he could have used.

Davis stressed that the young victim deserved most of the credit for the quick arrest in the case.

"She's been a remarkably composed young woman to be able to step up to the plate and help the detectives," he said. "We still recognize that the times ahead for her are going to be tough, but when she did the interview, she was just remarkable in terms of being able to give information."