Mom details ‘fright’ on daughter’s face before abduction

Incident is not first encounter with woman

THE FOUR-YEAR-OLD had been testing out her new scooter when the woman first approached her outside Jackson Square.

She bent down and said something to the little girl that her mother couldn’t hear. And when the child turned around, she had a look of terror on her face.

“My daughter looked at her with fright and kind of backed up a little bit away from her,” said the girl’s mother.

The mom, who was no more than five feet away from her daughter, started walking toward her when the woman “scooped her up into her arms” and wouldn’t let go.

The 27-year-old said she grabbed the arm of her child, who reached out to her and was screaming “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy.”

“I grabbed her and I said, ‘Put my daughter down,’” she recalled Friday. “I was screaming at her, ‘You’re not taking my daughter. You’re not going to hurt my daughter.’

“The words she returned to me was, ‘She’s not your daughter anymore. She’s not your daughter and you are not having her back.’”

Summer, who does not want her last name used to protect her daughter’s identity, said Wednesday’s interrupted abduction was not her family’s first encounter with the woman.

On Wednesday, two bystanders helped get her little girl back. Shortly

afterward, a woman was arrested outside the mall on King Street West and charged with child abduction. She remains in custody and is expected to appear in court Monday.

Police have said the woman facing charges had an “interaction” with at least one other child earlier this week. They’re asking people involved in similar incidents — one at King and James streets around 9:50 a.m. Wednesday — to come forward.

According to Summer, twice last week, the woman she says she saw outside Jackson Square walked past her and her daughter while her spouse dropped their other children off at a central Hamilton school. In both cases, she says the woman looked at the four-year-old and smiled but did not speak to them.

Then on Monday, while the family waited to catch a bus, she spotted the woman again, this time going back and forth to a silver SUV where she spoke to someone sitting in the driver’s seat, Summer said.

The woman tried to talk to her six-year-old son, who ran over to his mom and stood behind her in the bus shelter with his three siblings. “She stood there staring at us until the bus showed up,” said Summer, noting the woman started walking toward them. Before last week, Summer said, she’d never seen the woman.

Police say they don’t believe the victim and accused know each other. Court documents show the woman lives one street over from where the family resided before a recent move. Police say it’s too early to determine if there was a pattern to the interactions as they are waiting to hear about other incidents. “In order to move forward, we need the other people to come forward themselves and let us know the circumstances,” said Const. Jerome Stewart.

Since Wednesday, nights have been rough for Summer’s little girl.

The four-year-old has twitched throughout the night and has woken up crying. During the day, she’s the “same little girl,” but becomes emotional around strangers.

“We’re just praying that she’s going to forget this soon,” Summer said. “I know that I will never forget this.”

Police have charged Angel Charbonneau, 19, with child abduction.

Anyone with information is asked to contact police at 905-546-3817.