Cops captured a suspected kidnapper in southeast Washington state after she demanded a ransom in exchange for her victim, who has not been found.
A woman snatched Sandra Harris, 69, from her Kennewick home Friday morning and called her husband’s cell phone to demand an undisclosed amount of cash for her safe return, police said.
The missing woman’s husband, Randy Harris, called police around noon on Friday.
“It was not a random abduction,” Kennewick police Chief Ken Hohenberg told the Tri-City Herald.
The women knew each other but are not related, Hohenberg added.
Police arrested 49-year-old Theresa Wiltse after authorities set up a money drop near Eltopia in rural Franklin County, 30 miles north of the Oregon border, late Friday.
The suspect took the money and was stopped around 10 p.m. in a rental car with California plates. She was alone and there was no sign of Harris.
Wiltse was booked into Benton County jail pending kidnapping charges.
“It’s possible she acted alone,” said Sgt. Ken Lattin, adding that investigators are not discounting the possibility of additional suspects in the bizarre abduction plot.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has since joined the search for Harris, the Herald added.
