Brother drags sister, 4, from stranger's truck

When Chris Cort saw his 4-year-old sister seated in the stranger's pickup, alarm bells immediately went off.

Cort, 15, chased after the red pickup, yelling his sister's name and demanding the driver stop. The boy caught up to the truck just as it pulled up to a nearby house. He flung the passenger door open and grabbed his sister.

"I just gave [the driver] a really bad look and pulled my sister out," Cort said Tuesday.

A short time later, the driver of the pickup was in custody, suspected of luring two children with gifts and then kidnapping them late Monday afternoon in their Bothell-area neighborhood. The man lured a boy into his truck and bought him a bike, then lured Cort's 4-year-old sister into the truck by offering to buy her shoes, according to The Snohomish County Sheriff's Office.

Neither child was physically harmed, said sheriff's spokeswoman Rebecca Hover.

The man, Dean Richard Kinsman, 48, was booked into the Snohomish County Jail on two counts of second-degree kidnapping. He was ordered held Tuesday on $100,000 bail.

Exactly what the man's intentions were are unclear.

Several neighbors said Kinsman often has befriended children in the wooded neighborhood in unincorporated Snohomish County. Children frequently have congregated in front of his home, and he is known for building ramps for the youngsters' bikes, said one neighbor.

It was not clear if the boy and girl knew Kinsman, but the parents of each didn't know him and didn't give him permission to take the children, according to the Sheriff's Office.

Kinsman has been cited for only a few traffic offenses and has no felony record in Washington state, court records show.

Don Halcom, 34, the father of the 4-year-old girl, said Kinsman is "a little too friendly with other people's kids."

According to the Sheriff's Office and probable-cause documents, Kinsman first approached a 9-year-old boy, offering to buy him a bicycle if he got in the truck.

The boy agreed and the two drove to a nearby Fred Meyer store where Kinsman purchased a bike, according to the Sheriff's Office and the documents.

Kinsman then returned the boy, with the bike, to an address in the 20500 block of 11th Drive Southeast in unincorporated Bothell, the documents say.

Shortly after, Kinsman lured the 4-year-old girl in the same neighborhood into his truck by offering to buy her shoes, according to the documents and the Sheriff's Office; he also offered to buy her a bike, her father said.

The girl's brother, Chris Cort, said he saw her get into the truck, chased after it and followed it to Kinsman's home in a nearby cul-de-sac.

In the driveway, the brother pulled the girl out of the truck and took her back to her house, where family members called 911 about 5:25 p.m., according to the documents and the Sheriff's Office.

Cort and his younger brother, Tyler, said they returned to Kinsman's home with several teenage friends and saw Kinsman jump over a fence and run. The boys said they chased him and he doubled back and returned to the house.

Deputies then arrested Kinsman outside his home. While investigating the call, deputies learned of the incident involving the boy.

A woman living in the neighborhood said Tuesday that Kinsman initially asked her son to go with him to get a bike, while her son and the 9-year-old boy were outside.

The woman said her son called her at work to ask permission to go, but she told him no. The 9-year-old then agreed to go get the bike and came back with it, the woman said.

The woman said her son bought a bike from Kinsman two weeks ago, but Kinsman later came and took it back.

Halcom, father of the 4-year-old, said, "I think something was stopped that could've been really bad."

As detectives continue to investigate, the Sheriff's Office is asking anyone with information about Kinsman or the incident to call the sheriff's tip line at 425-388-3845.

Steve Miletich: 206-464-3302 or smiletich@seattletimes.com

The information in this article, originally published May 13, 2009, was corrected. Don Halcom is the father of a 4-year-old girl who was one of two children allegedly lured into a pickup during two kidnapping incidents in the Bothell area Monday. His first name was misspelled in a story about the incident. Halcom is 34 years old. He provided an incorrect age to a reporter.