NELVIN CEPEDA / Union-Tribune
Alyssa Nicole Mitchell, who will be 2 next
week, was reunited with her father and mother, Scott and Julie
Mitchell, yesterday after the family's SUV was found at UCSD.
Alyssa was asleep in the back seat when the vehicle was
stolen. |
LA JOLLA – Scott Mitchell
was scanning surveillance tapes yesterday, hoping to spot whoever
had stolen his wife's Toyota SUV with their little daughter sleeping
in the back seat.
A police detective listened intently to her walkie-talkie and
then told Mitchell, "She's OK."
"I just broke down in tears," he said. His next thought was, "Oh,
my God, I can't wait to see her."
Twenty minutes later, San Diego police had reunited Scott and
Julie Mitchell of Spring Valley with their daughter, Alyssa Nicole,
who turns 2 next Thursday.
The stolen Toyota 4Runner, with Alyssa sleeping in her car seat,
was found abandoned in a parking lot at UCSD about 4:20 p.m.
yesterday after a two-hour search and a statewide Amber Alert.
Two campus police community service officers spotted the SUV
along a red curb next to the Natural Sciences Building.
"We were both really happy because we found her and she was
safe," said community service officer Kari Norwood, 22. Her partner,
Jonathan Honda, 21, said the feeling "on a scale of zero to 10: This
would be a 20."
The auto thief remained at large as police converged on the
campus looking for a man reportedly dressed as a woman, wearing a
blond wig, a hot-pink blouse and denim shorts.
A person of that description had been seen inline-skating near
where the SUV was stolen, in front of a Subway sandwich shop on
Torrey Pines Road near La Jolla Shores Drive, police Capt. Dan
Johnson said.
UCSD police said they saw the same person on campus about half an
hour after the kidnapping was reported.
The family's ordeal began after Julie Mitchell, 28, a substitute
preschool teacher's aide, parked and went into the Subway shop. She
left the keys in the ignition, with the engine off and radio on. She
was putting down a deposit for food to buy for Alyssa's birthday
party on Saturday.
When the mother came out a few moments later, the SUV and her
daughter were gone. "I couldn't believe it had happened," Julie
Mitchell said. "I saw that my baby was gone and my car was gone.
. . . I was debating whether to take her in.
. . . "I thought, well, 'I'm just going to be in and out
super-quick.'
Julie Mitchell called police about 2:20 p.m.
Officers quickly notified
regional and border law agencies to watch for the Toyota and the
child.
The California Highway Patrol issued an Amber Alert by 4 p.m.,
causing electronic freeway signs across the state to flash the SUV's
license number.
Dozens of San Diego officers were called in to help search beach
parking lots and other areas.
UCSD police searched campus parking lots.
Norwood said she and Honda had been at it an hour, checking
license plates on several 4Runners, before they found the match.
They radioed in their find and waited for sworn officers to arrive.
An officer opened the back door and found Alyssa still sleeping.
The SUV's front windows were fully open, Honda said. Paramedics
examined the toddler, causing her to wake up and begin crying. When
her parents arrived, they rushed to hold her.
"It's been a very difficult few hours," Scott Mitchell, 38, told
reporters as he held his daughter. He said it had been a "terrifying
experience."
He builds off-road racing cars for Jimco in Santee. His employer
drove him to the Subway after they heard about his daughter.
Julie Mitchell said she had been on the hot, black asphalt
praying. "I was so relieved. I knew that God was totally watching
over her."
Scott Mitchell, speaking later at his house, said his wife
described to him that her feeling "was the lowest feeling you could
feel."
"Everyone's already made up their minds that she made a
mistake . . . and you're right, you shouldn't leave your
kid in the car," he said. "It was a poor choice. We all make poor
choices sometimes. She feels terrible, devastated."
Julie Mitchell concurred. "I made a mistake. It's not going to
happen again, ever."
