New York police said that a reported abduction of a Manhattan couple was an apparent hoax that was part of a surprise birthday party.
Several people came forward and there were no charges filed in the case, police told CNN. [ad]
In the incident, surveillance cameras captured men forcing a woman and her male companion in a minivan, which then speeds off. The abduction took place in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan on Friday evening.
“It was a Chrysler, it was like a navy blue Chrysler and it turned down the one way and it pulled over and stopped and a couple of guys came out and picked up a girl, pushed her in the car,” witness Jonethan Salas told ABC News.
Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said on Sunday that the kidnapping “may have been a hoax staged amongst friends to celebrate one of their birthdays,” according to CNN.
Witnesses also said that they heard a woman scream in the nearby vicinity. Other witnesses said they saw the men force the two into the van at gunpoint, according to NBC New York.
“It looked like they were targeted,” resident, Sarah Jacobson told the New York Times. “I don’t think it was random.”
Police said that no one issued a missing persons report after the two disappeared.
Over the weekend, authorities searched the neighborhood and posted flyers asking people to help locate the two.
