Louisiana Sanitation Workers Hailed As Heroes For Saving Kidnapped 10-Year-Old Girl
The two men used their truck to block in the abductor’s car until police could arrive.
Heroes Brandon Antoine and Dion Merrick, and their truck that they parked to block the escape of Michael Sereal [ABC News].
Two quick-thinking Louisiana sanitation workers helped save a 10-year-old girl who had been kidnapped from a relative’s home.
According to the Iberia Police Department, the child, Jalisa Lasalle, had disappeared between 1 and 2 p.m. on February 7. Authorities issued an Amber Alert later that night that included a description of the car she was last spotted getting into — a 2012 Nissan Altima.
Early the next morning, Pelican Waste & Debris employees Dion Merrick and Brandon Antoine were driving their trash pickup route when they spotted the silver sedan in a field located in St. Martin Parish, which is about 20 miles from where Lasalle vanished.
“Something told me ... I said, what's that car doing off in the field like that?” Merrick explained in a Facebook Live video shot at the scene, ABC News reported. WARNING: VIDEO CONTAINS STRONG LANGUAGE.
“I blocked the truck in, [making] sure he couldn’t get out” he said.
Michael Sereal [IPSO]
The two men then called police. Responding officers rescued the little girl from the car and arrested Michael Sereal, 33.
“She’s safe now,” Merrick said on Facebook Live after police took Sereal into custody, adding, “Thank God man … because I got a little girl … I'm on my job doing what I got to do.”
Sereal is charged with aggravated kidnapping of a child and failure to register as a sex offender. He is being held without bond in the Iberia Parish Jail, Lafayette’s KATC reported.
Sereal was convicted in 2016 of carnal knowledge of a juvenile and is listed on a sex offender database.
According to KATC, police said the suspect knows one of the victim’s family members.
Image: ABC News
