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Kidnap Attempt in Pleasanton

Original post made by Karen, Vintage Hills, on Oct 13, 2007

From the S.F. Chronicle....

Web Link

(10-13) 13:26 PDT PLEASANTON -- Pleasanton police said today they are investigating what may have been an attempted kidnapping of a 9-year-old girl after school, one of several apparently unrelated crimes targeting young girls in the Bay Area in recent days.
According to Pleasanton authorities, a Vintage Hills Elementary School student was waiting in the 1100 block of Kottinger Drive at 3 p.m. Friday when she was approached by an unknown woman.
The woman told the girl that her father could not pick her up and that she was sent by her father to get her. The girl refused to get into the woman's car and got into her own mother's car moments later.
Police said the woman, described as being about 50 years old, heavyset with shoulder length blond or brown frizzy or curly hair, was driving a small 4-door sedan, gray or white, with a rear spoiler.

Comments (12)

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Posted by tiffany
a resident of Vintage Hills Elementary School
on Oct 14, 2007 at 7:07 pm

Why do we get this report from the SF Chronicle? Has it been reported by our local papers? If not, why not?

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Posted by Member
a resident of Vintage Hills Elementary School
on Oct 15, 2007 at 7:33 am

I had to search a paper in San Jose to find an article about this...why hasn't the local papers reported this? Vintage Hills has my e-mail address....i'm sure they knew about it and they could have sent out an FYI e-mail. I think there needs to be notification sent out via radio, e-mail or local T.V. station as soon as something like this happens at any school!!!

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Posted by Barbara
a resident of Vintage Hills
on Oct 15, 2007 at 8:51 am

I believe the Times ran this article on Saturday.

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Posted by Katie
a resident of Vintage Hills
on Oct 15, 2007 at 9:56 am

It would have been very easy for the school to notify parents over the weekend- each teacher contacts parents of the children in his or her classroom. It is older children (around the same age as the child on Friday)that were more likely to have walked to school this am and as a result were potential victims this am. Why weren't the parents notified?

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Posted by member
a resident of Vintage Hills Elementary School
on Oct 15, 2007 at 12:41 pm

In response to Barbara:
It was in one local paper where the incident happened??? That should have been all over the local papers/news!! I called the school district this morning to ask them what their plans are for mass notification. They said there are working on it. I do understand that the need to wait for Pleasnton PD to look into it to make sure it is a legit complaint but i feel the school needs to notify the parents off the students via e-mail...phone call...whatever it takes. Once PD releases it as truth...then notify the other schools. the Herald can write up numerous articles on the mayors bird but they can't publish an article about what happened???

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Posted by Member 2
a resident of Walnut Grove Elementary School
on Oct 15, 2007 at 5:43 pm

I agree with "member" (lol I didn't know what else to address you by). After hearing about this and then the weapon threat this morning, and other situations that have happened- why hasn't PUSD come up with a way of notifying parents? I know this isn't college, but they should look into some system similar to what was talked about when the school shootings back east happened. The one where some mass text message gets sent to cell phones to inform parents (maybe students if it's high school), of what is going on. Why does it seem like when anything comes up, the district hides or won't tell the whole truth? I know it takes time to get results or what happened, but the basic facts should made public as soon as something happens; ESPECIALLY if it involves this situation when children are endangered. BOO to PUSD for not having a plan of action or acting on one right away.

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Posted by member3
a resident of San Ramon
on Oct 16, 2007 at 1:11 pm

Wow! now that's using our technology to its fullest potential! I approve mass text messages!

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Posted by Touriga Drive Resident
a resident of Vintage Hills Elementary School
on Oct 16, 2007 at 4:15 pm

PUSD cares about the safety of our children!

If you are wondering why PUSD didn't notify parents of the incident, then you should be wondering why the police didn't notify PUSD on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday! I heard that no one at PUSD was notified, not even the principal of the school. The Pleasanton School District does have the technology to notify parents (auto phone dial and E-Connection email). They care about their students safety and want to keep parents informed. They have to verify the information with our city departments first. Unfortunately, PUSD was left out of the information loop on this one. The police were oddly quiet on this or they would have notified the local papers to alert the community. They must have had a reason. How did the other papers find out?

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Posted by Kathy
a resident of Vintage Hills Elementary School
on Oct 16, 2007 at 4:17 pm

PUSD cares about the safety of our children!

If you are wondering why PUSD didn't notify parents of the incident, then you should be wondering why the police didn't notify PUSD on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday! I heard that no one at PUSD was notified, not even the principal of the school. The Pleasanton School District does have the technology to notify parents (auto phone dial and E-Connection email). They care about their students safety and want to keep parents informed. They have to verify the information with our city departments first. Unfortunately, PUSD was left out of the information loop on this one. The police were oddly quiet on this or they would have notified the local papers to alert the community. They must have had a reason. How did the other papers find out?

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Posted by Anonymous
a resident of Another Pleasanton neighborhood
on Oct 19, 2007 at 7:15 am

The Principal DID have the information over the weekend. However, PUSD did not. My daughter attended Vintage Hills for a few months and I always thought the Principal was totally incompetent.

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Posted by Rob
a resident of Walnut Grove Elementary School
on Oct 19, 2007 at 1:24 pm

I just read online that this attempted kidnap was a misunderstanding. Supposedly, the woman was across the street calling to her daughter and was waiting in a line of cars to pick her up. Hmm interesting news. Makes me think...

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Posted by Name hidden
a resident of Ridgeview Commons

on Apr 25, 2017 at 5:17 pm

Due to repeated violations of our Terms of Use, comments from this poster are automatically removed. Why?


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