STANFORD, KY — Police in Kentucky have found a missing 16-year-old North Carolina girl under a shutter in a 34-year-old man's bedroom after the man's mother called authorities to report a domestic dispute between the two, according to reports. according to arrest reports.
When Lincoln County Sheriff's Office deputies arrived at the home on Christmas Day, Zachary Jones told them the girl had fled, but his mother disputed that and deputies began searching to check on her safety, reports said. She was found “in a bedroom, in a door cut out in the floor, covered with a rug,” the report said.
Officers later determined she had been reported missing on December 6 in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
The girl told officers that Jones picked her up after reaching out a few weeks earlier and that he originally told her he was 19. When they met and she wondered why he looked older, he told her he was 25, but she found out after she went to his house and met his family that he was 34, the reports said. She said he threatened her and told her to tell people she was 18.
She told officers he had a gun and had threatened to kill her several times and that the day they were found they had used drugs and that he had choked and assaulted her, according to arrest reports.
Jones was originally taken into custody for trying to destroy drug paraphernalia that officers found in the home while searching for the girl, reports said.
Jones admitted to using drugs with her and getting into an argument, but he denied choking her, a report said. Spots were visible on her throat, it said. Jones and the girl both said they had sex multiple times, and Jones admitted to luring her by using an electronic device and taking her from her grandmother's home in North Carolina, the reports said.
He was charged with multiple crimes, including third-degree rape, unlawful confinement, assault, strangulation, possession of a controlled substance and unlawful transaction with a minor.
It was not clear whether Jones has an attorney, but he told WKYT-TV from jail that the girl appeared older and that he tried to help her as he drove to North Carolina to pick her up.
“Her grandmother kicked her out. She didn't seem that old (16). She had all kinds of piercings,” Jones said.
He also said he did not hide her when police began searching his home.
“She hid of her own free will. She was actually in bed when the police officers first got in there,” Jones said.
The girl's grandfather, Eugene Baughman, told the station that she had run away from her grandmother's house, and they reported her missing after losing communication with her.
Baughman said he doesn't think Jones was trying to help the teen.
“I don't think he was saving anyone. I think he was trying to find another person to victimize,” Baughman said.
Jones' mother told WRAL-TV in North Carolina that she believed the girl was an adult.
“I asked him how old she was. He said, 'She's 19.' So I took that as the truth,” Rhona Jones told the station. “I believed him because a lot of girls looked older than they are.”
She also said the girl was not held against her will.
“To me, she loved going with him,” Rhonda Jones said. “I just feel like they were probably talking. I don't know how long he's been texting her. From what the police said it was clear that she was not happy where she was, that she felt like she was being cared for and she went with him.”