Jennifer Maxwell saw a barefoot 12-year-old emerge from woods, stopped to help and soon learned authorities were dealing with an alleged kidnapping.
ERWIN, N.C. — Jennifer Maxwell was driving home from work when she noticed a child come out of the woods beside U.S. Highway 421, descend an embankment and end up crying in a ditch — an encounter that would connect a 12-year-old girl’s escape from an alleged kidnapping with police searching for the man accused of taking her.
Maxwell told WRAL she turned her vehicle around and pulled near the girl, who had no shoes and had scratches on her arms and legs. She asked whether the child was all right. The girl said she had been kidnapped. Maxwell called 911, got the child into her vehicle and eventually took her to the Erwin Police Department. That roadside decision placed the girl in the care of authorities and gave investigators a starting point for locating the vehicle of Daniel Francis Gear, 38, who was arrested later that night.
Gear is charged with first-degree kidnapping and assault on a female in connection with the Aug. 16 incident. Court documents allege that he unlawfully restrained a girl younger than 16, moved her without the consent of a parent or legal guardian and did so for the purpose of terrorizing her. The warrant says she was not released in a safe place. Another allegation says he pushed the girl to the ground and physically restrained her. Gear has not been convicted of those accusations, and authorities have not publicly disclosed an alleged motive.
The girl’s account to Maxwell, as Maxwell later described it to reporters, began not beside the highway but at a friend’s home in Lillington. Maxwell said the child told her she had been spending the night with her best friend when Gear woke her and directed her to get into his truck. Local reports described Gear as the girl’s friend’s uncle or a relative associated with the home. Sheriff Wayne Coats said Gear lived near where the child had been staying but had no relationship of his own with the 12-year-old.
Maxwell said the child told her Gear drove away from the home and eventually stopped near woods, where he made her get out. The girl described being made to walk through the wooded area while Gear pushed her and grabbed her shoulder, Maxwell said. She recalled the child saying they walked for a couple of hours. At some point, the girl got away and moved toward the highway. The public arrest warrant corroborates allegations of restraint and forced movement but does not contain every detail Maxwell said the child described.
By the time the girl emerged from the woods, she was barefoot and visibly scratched, according to Maxwell. The driver said she could not tell whether the marks came from briars, brush or something else. That distinction has not been established publicly. Authorities took the girl for a medical evaluation after she reached police. The sheriff’s office later said she was released from the hospital and recovering with her family. Investigators have not released medical records or a detailed description of injuries, and the girl’s name has been withheld.
Maxwell’s role did not end with the initial 911 call. She said she showed authorities where she had encountered the girl. Gear’s vehicle was found in the area, but Gear was not there, according to Sheriff Coats. That discovery helped shift the law-enforcement response toward a search along U.S. 421. Authorities warned that Gear was considered armed and dangerous while deputies looked for him. Later Sunday night, officers located him in a wooded area along the highway and arrested him.
The search lasted about seven hours, according to local reports. Its length illustrates the gap between the girl’s escape and Gear’s arrest, but public reporting leaves portions of that period unexplained. Authorities have not publicly said what Gear allegedly did during those hours or why he remained in the wooded area where deputies eventually found him. Nor have they described any interaction between Gear and the girl after the point at which she escaped. The verified record is clearer on the endpoints: the child reached safety, and Gear was later taken into custody.
When investigators filed the criminal allegations, the legal focus moved away from the dramatic roadside recovery and toward the specific conduct prosecutors say occurred. A kidnapping charge requires the state to prove the elements of the offense in court, and the warrant’s allegations that the child was restrained, moved without guardian permission and terrorized remain unproven accusations. The assault charge similarly reflects the allegation that Gear pushed and physically restrained the girl. No available public record reviewed for this article establishes a conviction or guilty plea.
A judge set Gear’s secured bond at $2.5 million after his arrest, according to local court reporting. The court also imposed restrictions reported to include no contact with the victim and no being alone with a person younger than 18 if he were released. An initial probable-cause hearing was scheduled for Sept. 1. Reliable reports located for this article did not provide a verified later ruling from that hearing or a final resolution of the case, so the court process beyond those early proceedings remains unclear in the public material reviewed.
For Maxwell, the day took another unexpected turn after the police response. She told WRAL that after giving information to authorities, she was involved in a vehicle collision not far from the police station. Her car was totaled, she said, and she went to the hospital because she was sore. The trip led to a second meeting with the girl she had found. Maxwell said the child’s parents approached her there and thanked her for helping their daughter.
That hospital encounter gave Maxwell a different view of the story’s outcome than the one she had seen at the ditch. Instead of a crying child emerging from woods without shoes, she saw the girl with her family and said she was relieved that the child was able to leave the hospital. Authorities have disclosed little about the girl’s recovery beyond saying she was released and was back with relatives. Keeping those details limited also protects the privacy of a minor whose identity has not been made part of the public case.
Neighbors later told local reporters that the girl was known around the area because she frequently visited her friend. Some said Gear himself was not well known to them. Those impressions do not explain the alleged crime, and investigators have not offered a public theory of motive. The strongest verified connection between Gear and the child remains the household where she was visiting and the sheriff’s statement that Gear had no direct relationship with her. Reports describing him as the friend’s uncle help explain why he was present around the home but do not answer why authorities say he took the girl.
The case also shows why Maxwell’s observations must be separated from allegations she learned after stopping. She personally described seeing the girl come from the woods, crying, scratched and barefoot. She did not witness the alleged removal from the Lillington home or the events the child later described in the woods. Those portions of the story come from the child’s reported statements, the arrest warrant and law-enforcement accounts. Maintaining those lines of attribution is particularly important in a pending criminal case involving a minor.
More than a month after the Aug. 16 incident, the publicly verified account remains centered on the girl’s escape, her transfer into police care and Gear’s arrest later the same day. The latest reliable reports reviewed for this article do not supply a final court disposition or an announced motive. The child was last reported recovering with her family, while Gear faced the kidnapping and assault allegations arising from the encounter.
Author note: Last updated September 28, 2026.