LEWISTON — Police have arrested the mother of 9-year-old twins who police say were abducted in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and found safe at their mother’s boyfriend’s home in Lewiston less than six hours later.
Local police charged the mother, 35-year-old Chereese Ford and her boyfriend, Craig Beaudoin, 38, as fugitives from justice. They were being held without bail in the Androscoggin County Jail on Thursday. A police detective in Plymouth, Massachusetts, had secured warrants in that state for kidnapping charges against Beaudoin and Ford.
The two fourth-graders, Je t’aime Valentine and Dasia Valentine, disappeared after a school bus dropped them off near their home in Plymouth at about 4 p.m. Wednesday. Their father, who has custody, reported them missing and police began investigating.
They were forced into a car, police told Boston media. Boston radio station WBZ reported that police reviewed surveillance video from the area and discovered Beaudoin had taken them.
When they tracked him to his home in Maine at about 9:20 p.m., they found the girls unharmed.
Thursday morning, nobody answered the door at Beaudoin’s small beige ranch at 55 Charles St. in Lewiston. It had two cars in the driveway, one with a white blanket in the back seat, and a trailer with two snowmobiles. Two hula hoops leaned against a door to the garage.
Beaudoin and Ford appeared in 8th District Court on Thursday afternoon for an initial court appearance.
Ford was accused last spring of aggravated forgery and theft by deception for allegedly filing a false written statement with the state as part of a scheme to collect food assistance and welfare money by claiming her two minor children were living with her when they were not.
Lewiston police credited “the exceptional communication and cooperation” it had with the Plymouth Police Department for the swift retrieval of the girls.
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
