Kidnapping Victim Leads Police to Body
A woman who was kidnapped, bound, gagged and sexually assaulted led police Monday to a body wrapped and stuffed in the back of a sport utility vehicle in the San Fernando Valley.
Van Nuys patrol officers received a call at 12:50 p.m. about a screaming woman in the courtyard of a housing complex in the 13900 block of Sherman Way.
Trembling and draped in a blue housecoat, a woman who identified herself as Monique begged police to protect her from a man who she said had lured her into his car and forced her to help him move a body before attacking her.
With bindings still hanging from her left ankle, the woman tearfully recounted how her attacker threatened to kill her. She also repeated, “There’s a dead body” in the back of the SUV.
About 30 minutes later, police descended on a nearby residence in the 7100 block of Costello Avenue. There, they found a gray SUV in a carport and removed the body of an unidentified woman. Los Angeles Police detectives said late Monday that they were looking for Paul Alan Ott of Van Nuys as a “person of interest” in the case, but they declined to say whether he was a suspect.
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