Amber Alert helps spot girl, dad

It went out after an Inver Grove Heights teen was taken from home by her father, a convicted sex offender.

By Jim Adams, Star Tribune

Last update: February 13, 2007 - 10:15 PM

About 14 hours after an Amber Alert was issued for an Inver Grove Heights girl who disappeared with her father, Bloomington police found the two at a Mall of America bus stop shortly before noon Tuesday.

Deidre Michuda, 14, was taken from her home Monday afternoon by her father, who had a 1994 sexual molestation conviction and a court order that prohibits him from having any unsupervised visitation.

Police said Stephen M. Michuda, 34, apparently picked up Deidre at school and took her to her mother's home. Only her four siblings were there at the time. The siblings told Inver Grove Heights police that their father had two BB gun pistols and a knife when he left with Deidre before 4 p.m., said Lt. Jerry Salmey. The girl's mother called police about 6:15 p.m. Police contacted the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA), and an Amber Alert was issued shortly before 10 p.m. Monday.

A citizen spotted the pair at the mall transit station and called Bloomington police, who picked them up without incident about 11:45 a.m. Tuesday. Deidre, who appeared to be OK, was back home with her mother Tuesday evening. Her father is being held in the Dakota County jail, said Inver Grove Heights Police Chief Chuck Kleckner.

"Somebody saw the pictures on TV or the newspapers and called police," he said.

The girl's mother declined to comment and avoided reporters when she left the Bloomington police station with her daughter.

Although the girl's four siblings didn't notice anything awry before the girl and her father left the home, police were questioning her to see if she went with him willingly. Kleckner said he couldn't answer that question or how the father and daughter traveled to the mall from South St. Paul, where the father's van was found about 10 a.m. Tuesday.

Police will present their reports to the Dakota County attorney's office, which has until noon Thursday to file charges, Kleckner said. He wouldn't comment on reports that the father had baby sat at the girl's home before.

Amber Alerts are not issued for cases of parental abduction unless police believe the child is in imminent danger, said Janell Rasmussen, coordinator of the state Amber Alert for the BCA. She said an alert was issued for Deidre because of Michuda's past conviction of sexually molesting a minor in 1994, because he was seen with weapons, and had a court order prohibiting unsupervised visitation.

Jim Adams • 612-673-7658 • jadams@startribune.com