July 30, 2015
Editor's note: Because the five-year-old girl possibly was sexually assaulted, PhillyVoice has removed the identities of the girl and her mother from this story.
Philadelphia Police are trying to identify the person responsible for abducting and brutally beating a 5-year-old North Philadelphia girl Tuesday night.
The victim is recovering from serious injuries after being beaten unconscious in her weeded backyard, NBC10 reported. Police are handling the case as a stranger residential intrusion and child abduction. They are looking for the public's assistance in identifying the perpetrator.
Police said Thursday that the victim was not sexually assaulted. However, 6ABC reported Friday that police now were investigating the incident as a sexual assault, but a police public information officer said she could not confirm that to PhillyVoice.
Police responded to the 2600 block of North Hutchinson Street at 7:57 a.m. Tuesday, where they found the child in the backyard with her mother, police said in a press release. The child had head and facial injuries.
The 29-year-old mother told police that she noticed her daughter was missing when she awoke at 7 a.m. Tuesday. After unsuccessfully searching inside and in front of the residence, the mother told police she looked out an upstairs window to find her daughter in the backyard.
"I thought she was dead," the mother told NBC10. "I was just crying and screaming."
The victim told her mother that she was walking in the hallway during the night when a man came from behind the closet door, took her by the hand and made her exit the back door, the mother told police. The victim said the man kicked and punched her in the face.
The victim, who sustained head trauma, facial cuts, contusions and a fracture to her face, was transported to St. Christopher's Hospital by police and is in stable condition, police said. The victim was not sexually assaulted.
