Kidnap victim's signals to Edina cop ends ordeal

By PATRICE RELERFORD , Star Tribune

Last update: July 26, 2008 - 1:23 PM

A woman who abruptly slowed down and put on her turn signal while driving on Hwy. 100 this week helped an alert Edina police officer put an end to her own kidnapping.

Officer Brian Hubbard was conducting a traffic stop on northbound Hwy. 100 near West 50th Street after 2 a.m. Thursday when he noticed the car. Hubbard finished the first traffic stop and then pulled over the second car.

During the stop, the woman mouthed the words "help me" to the officer. Hubbard told her to get out of the car. She told him she didn't know where her ex-boyfriend, who sat in the passenger seat, intended to take her.

According to a criminal complaint, Jorge Vazquez-Sanchez, 33, of Brooklyn Center, had waited for the woman outside her home in the 6400 block of Girard Avenue in Richfield.

Upon her arrival, Vazquez-Sanchez grabbed her hair as she attempted to run inside her home and forced her into his car, the complaint said.

While in the car, Vazquez-Sanchez told her not to do anything as "it could get worse," according to the complaint. He then said: "I'd rather kill myself and then you, instead of you not being with me."

The woman was taken to Fairview Southdale Hospital, where she was treated for a bruised forearm and a contusion on her ankle.

Vazquez-Sanchez was charged with kidnapping, violation of a protection order, domestic assault and felony terroristic threats. He is being held in Hennepin County jail and is scheduled to appear in court Monday.

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