Police: 18-year-old ran from armed men

Jacksonville Sheriff's Office says teenage girl is safe, being questioned

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Police say an 18-year-old girl is safe after claiming she got away from two armed men Tuesday morning in the Brentwood area of Jacksonville's Northside.

The Jacksonville Sheriff's Office said the teenager told officers she was walking to Andrew Jackson High School along 27th at Main streets about 8 a.m. when two men abducted her at gunpoint.

Police later said there was no kidnapping, and that they are only investigating the incident as a robbery, but they did not provide details.

Earlier in the day, the girl's mother described it as an abduction.

"One got out and snatched her by her jacket and her hair, and they slung her in the backseat of the car," the teen's mother said. "He had her head down, held her at gunpoint."

She said one of the men tried to rob her. According to police, the teen took the phone of one of the men, and they grabbed her purse and phone.

"My daughter knows to fight, kick, whatever it is that you have to do, handle yourself to be able to get away and get free, and she did just that," the teen's mother said.

The girl told police that when the car stopped at a dead end of 25th Street at Brentwood Park, she got out and ran to her grandmother's home, then called police, investigators said.

"I'm just glad that she made it here safe, because someone else's child might not have been that lucky," the teen's mother said. "It's said because these streets our not safe for our children."

The victim's mother and grandmother said she was shaken up but was OK.

"She don't want to walk nowhere no more, she said," said Patricia Macon, the teen's grandmother. "From now on she's going to get taken to school. I'm not taken another chance by her walking."

Police said they were looking for two male suspects, possibly in their teens, in a black Chevrolet Impala with dark, tinted windows and two leather seats. They said one was wearing a black windbreaker with lime green trim.

The school was not put on lockdown at any point.

Anyone with any information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 866-845-TIPS.


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Jim Piggott is the reporter to count on when it comes to city government and how it will affect the community.