Teen’s pic may show man who has been trying to lure children

A quick-thinking teenage girl took a cellphone picture of the man who police think has had several suspicious encounters with children in Pembroke Pines.

The latest incident happened about 3 p.m. Tuesday on the 10900 block of Northwest 15th Street, near Hiatus Road, as the girl was walking home from her bus stop.

According to police, a man who had been driving a gray Toyota Scion began to walk behind the teen saying he wanted to talk to her. When the girl ignored him and continued to walk toward home, “The suspect then stated that he had a gun and if she did not stop in three seconds, he would pull his gun out,” Pembroke Pines Sgt. Angela Goodwin said.

Sandra Sanchez, the mother of the 17-year-old girl, said when her daughter later told her about the gun threat, “My heart dropped, my world spun at the moment, I just got so nervous.”

But as the incident was happening, her daughter had been listening to music on her phone and immediately called her father who was inside her nearby home.

“Daddy come outside now,” the girl told her father, according to Sanchez.

After hearing the teen call her father, the man who had been following her ran back to his SUV, but not before the girl had the presence of mind to take his picture as he was running away.

“She had the phone in her hand, that’s why she was able to take the picture so quickly,” Sanchez said.

The family took the image to Pembroke Pines police. Investigators think it is linked to similar suspicious incidents “due to similar vehicle and suspect descriptions.”

In late September, police released an updated sketch of the man who investigators say approached several children in Pembroke Pines in recent weeks offering to charge their cellphones. No children have been hurt or abducted in any of the incidents.

On Tuesday, police said they located a person who matched the person in the sketch. So far, there has been no arrest announced in the case.

Police ask anyone who may also have been approached by the man or who know him to call 954-431-2200, email Tips@ppines.com or call Broward County Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477.