Mom Says Attempted Kidnapper Tried To Rip Baby from Her Arms in Walmart Store
A man is facing charges after what a Georgia woman said was an attempted kidnapping in a Walmart parking lot.
Katie Exum of Nashville, Georgia, said she was hoping to change her infant son and was walking in the parking lot of the Valdosta, Georgia, Walmart when she was approached by a man, WALB reported.
“My son needed his diaper changed and the stuff was in car, so I came back in the car to change his diaper and, as I was leaving the car to go back in the store, a man approached me and grabbed my son by the arm and said, ‘You need to come with me,’ and I said no and snatched my son back from him and ran inside,” she said, according to WTXL-TV.
She said the man tried to shield himself from security cameras.
“He put his back towards the cameras and grabbed him by the arm, and started pulling on him,” she said, according to WFXL. “I said, ‘No!'”
“I was mad, scared a little bit for my son’s life,” Exum told WALB. “I just wanted him to be safe and away from that man. There’s no telling what kind of dangers he could’ve done to any of us.”
She said the man tried to grab her. She then moved the child she was holding to the side away from the man and entered the store, she said.
“At that time I was just thinking to get my son away from this man. No matter what I have to do, get him away,” Exum said.
She said the man told her that he would be back and bring a friend.
Exum went into the store, to find some family members who were part of the group she was with, and then called other family members in nearby Nashville who came to join her.
“I was scared and p—-d off that it was happening to us. That people think it’s just okay to grab somebody’s young one like that,” said Denise Shirley, Exum’s aunt.
Shirley said that they confronted the man, and called the police.
She claimed the man admitted he was hoping to traffic the infant.
“While police were trying to get him, he was telling me that he was one of those people that traffic people,” Exum said. “Just out of the blue, he just told me that.”
“It made me sick. Whether he was just drunk and saying it or if he really does that for a living, it made me physically sick,” said Shirley.
Harry Dotson, 45, was arrested and charged with criminal attempt to kidnap, public drunkenness, obstruction and battery.
“He got arrested very quickly and was away from the streets. If he was still here, he could’ve still done that to some other lady in their baby. So I’m very thankful that he got arrested,” Exum told WALB.
“You hear all of the stories about it and you never think it would happen to you,” Exum said, “It scares me though that there’s people out there like that.”
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