Mom outwits stranger who offers $1,500 for her 2-year-old child, Washington cops say
A quick-thinking mom outwitted a stranger who offered to buy her 2-year-old child for $1,500 at a Shoreline, Washington, transit center, sheriff’s officials say.
The woman declined but got the 43-year-old man’s email and phone number “in case she changed her mind,” the King County Sheriff’s Office reported on Facebook.
She contacted the sheriff’s office after the Sept. 22 incident and passed on the man’s contact information, deputies wrote.
A Metro Transit Police Street Crimes Unit detective posing as the mom contacted the man and told him she was 17 years old, the release says. Saying he was no longer interested in buying the child, the man pressed her to work for him as a prostitute.
Detectives arranged to meet the man Monday and arrested him on suspicion of promoting commercial sexual abuse of a minor, deputies reported.
After his arrest, the man asked to make a phone call and advised a friend to clean out his hotel room, the release says. Police searched the room and found a stolen firearm.
The sheriff’s office did not release the man’s name.
