"Jane Doe" - 6 yo - Los Angeles CA

Criminal were filed Wednesday against a 60-year-old transient
accused of kidnapping a 6-year-old girl from a Metro bus on Sunday
night.


James John Thomas, 60, is scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday afternoon
at the downtown Los Angeles courthouse on one felony count each of
kidnapping and committing a lewd act on a child.

Thomas was arrested Sunday after a homeless woman riding a bus
told the driver she had fallen asleep on the bus and when she woke up
her daughter was missing, Deputy Jeff Gordon of the Los Angeles
Sheriff's Department said.

"In speaking to the mother, she stated to the deputies that before she
fell asleep she saw a homeless man on the bus whom she had seen before
but who was not a friend of hers," Gordon said. "When she awoke, her
daughter was missing from the bus and so was the man."

About two hours later, another MTA driver heard a radio dispatch about
the missing child, and called police to report that the child and
Thomas were on his bus at a layover at Vermont Avenue and 120th Street
in South Los Angeles, Gordon said.

Authorities took suspect Thomas into custody on suspicion of kidnapping. The girl was placed in protective custody, he said.