Kendu Bolice police arrest woman over alleged kidnap of 10-year-old

Rescued girl Wendy Michel speaks to The Standard at Kendu Bay Police Station. The girl was rescued from a woman who allegedly kidnapped her on September 5, 2016. (PHOTO: JAMES OMORO/ STANDARD)

"Please help me find my parents and my siblings. I am really missing them," was the appeal yesterday by a girl, 10, who claims to have been abducted.

The girl, who gave her name as Wendy Michel, claims she was abducted in Kisumu in April last year.

She has been given refuge at Kendu Bay Police Station.

As the girl (pictured) spoke to The Standard, her alleged abductor, a 38-year-old woman, was behind bars at the same police station.

Police said they rescued the girl from a home in Mawego, East Karachuonyo, where she has been living with the woman.

Police are now looking for the girl's parents, who they say will help them press charges against the suspect if it is true she abducted the child.

But the woman says that she never kidnapped the girl. The woman says she helped the child after she found her abandoned at Nairobi's Machakos bus terminus and that she has been trying to trace her parents since.

Sergeant Francis Pius Orodi of Mawego Administration Police camp arrested the suspect after the girl narrated her ordeal.

According to the minor, the woman found her playing with other children at Koyango in Manyatta estate, Kisumu.

She allegedly tricked her into accompanying her to Kisumu Central Business District where she bought her goodies.

"She told me to accompany her to town so as to buy me some items to bring back to my mother. I decided to do so," said Wendy.

The minor said the woman bought her a bottle of water and mandazi which she ate as they sat under a tree.

The woman then allegedly told her to board a motorcycle, which took them to Mawego village in Rachuonyo North sub-county.

Wendy said the woman renamed her Anne Atieno. "They kept calling me Anne yet my name is Wendy. She stole me from my parents in Kisumu," said the minor.

The girl says her father's name is James Odhiambo, a hawker at Kisumu bus station. Her mother, Akinyi, she said, bakes cakes for sale.

"I am the first born in our family and my younger siblings are Joy and Clinton," she said.

Last Friday, the suspect accused the girl of stealing her Sh250. The opportunity to escape came when the woman's relatives started caning her over the loss. "It was because of the caning that I fled home and sought refuge at the local AP camp."