- The most important things you can do to stop from becoming the victim of a kidnapper is NEVER GO with anyone you don’t want to and DON’T LET ANYONE TAKE YOU anywhere you don’t want to go. Yell, scream, fight and run from any potential abductor. No matter what the bad guy says, make as much noise and attract as much attention as you can.
- Don’t be afraid to tell your parents or teacher if you feel threatened, even if someone has told you not to talk. If victimized it is never your fault and never something you should be ashamed of or hide. Your parents love you and if you disappear, no matter what anyone says, they will never stop loving you and looking for you.
- If someone tries to lure you into a vehicle, run the opposite way the vehicle is facing, forcing the kidnapper to turn around to chase you.
- Run to your home or to a neighbor’s home or public place yelling that someone is trying to kidnap you.
- If you’re on your bike, grip the bike. The kidnapper can’t get you and your bike into the car. If you’re on the street and you can’t run, grab a street light, traffic sign, trash can, mail box or other fixed object while yelling for help.
- If the kidnapper points a gun at you, RUN ANYWAY. Most kidnappers don’t want to attract attention by firing a gun and they probably couldn’t hit you anyway. It’s better to be wounded and left to get help, than to go off with a kidnapper.
- If grabbed, twist your body and scream “this is not my dad (or my mom)!”
- If your assailant grabs you by your coat or backpack, twist out of his grip, leaving him with the coat or backpack as you run and scream towards another nearby adult. Attract the attention of this adult by grabbing and holding on to them.
- If forced into the front seat of a 4-door car or van, immediately jump into the back seat, open the door and escape. Don’t put on your seat-belt as this will obviously slow your escape time.
- If placed in the trunk of a car, look for the emergency trunk release lever and pull it and escape. If you can’t find this, pull out the wires to the tail lights on both sides of the trunk, thereby attracting attention to the vehicle when the stop lights don’t work. Tell police that your child knows how to do this; therefore the police will be looking for cars with malfunctioning taillights.
- Grab the keys from the kidnapper’s car and throw them out the window.
- If in traffic, step on the accelerator and make the car crash into the car in front of it.
- Honk the horn and try to force the kidnapper to wreck the car.
- Do not eat or drink anything your kidnapper gives to you (it may be drugged).
- If your kidnapper takes you into a store, knock things down, break bottles, yell and scream that you have been kidnapped.
- If you’re held in a house, flash the lights on the front porch off and on. If in an upper apartment, flood the bathroom to cause water to flood the apartment below.
- Never stop trying to escape and always take the opportunity to use a phone to call 911 to ask for help.
- Never, never, never, never give up. Parents, family, and friends will never give up looking for missing children.
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On 10.24.09—By Dr. Clint Van Zandt
These are safety tips that every child should know and practice. Discuss and practice these things. While doing everything we can to prevent our children from becoming the victim of a kidnapper, we need to also equip them with the above information to help them escape should they be taken. Information is key and can save the life of your child.
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10 Responses to “How to Escape a Kidnapper”
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This is a great article with invaluable advice for kids that I would never have thought to teach them by myself.
I am forever telling my grandchildren tip’s. Love the article! Thanks for sharing.
Dr. Van Zandt,
I’m a child/personal/internet safety speaker/trainer and have just chanced upon your website from the family watchdog site. I’m happy to report that all of your tips are ones that I use in my presentations.
Regarding #7, I tell my audience to teach their kids to say “You’re not my mommy” or “You’re not my daddy”. Is there a particular reason, you’re using “This isn’t (my mom or dad)”?
I’m glad to read that you recommend getting into a car accident if necessary (#12) because I received flack from law enforcement for that one while on a recent national speaking/training tour for Amber Ready, Inc. (www.amberready.com) to the extent that I had to remove it from my presentation. Now I can reference you.
Additionally, I recommend that if someone is shooting at you to run away in a zig zag pattern, as learned from the Fox Valley Training Materials. I see that you have not included that tip. Is there a reason?
I’m a supporter of your work and would like to keep in touch with you. How may I do that? Are you on Facebook? I will send you a friend request.
Warmest regards,
Suzanne Stanford
Hi I want to thank you so much for these articles. I am a survior of childhood sexual assult. Now a mother although well aware of the dangers, I didn`t know how to start the conversation regaurding abduction and assults without robbing my kids of thier innocence, you helped give me an outline and bullet points that empower my whole family. I was able to cover key points, speak from my own experiance without robbing them of thier innocence….Thank you,
Elisa
Very well written. A child in the trunk of the car could also try to kick out the tail light and wave his hand through the opening. The sight of a hand would surely attract attention of any following motorist.
In as far as the comment made in the prior post of being afraid to bring up the topic of being kidnapped to your child for fear of the child losing his innocence, as a parent I would prefer my child be neurotic than missing, exploited or dead.
From the moment my daughter was touched and then grabbed at a grocery store just a few feet from me I went into “watch mode” and have never left it. Parents please remember that abductors look for the opportunity to grab a child. We parents cannot give them that chance.
If your kids need to be alone at home, or at the bus stop before or after school, tell them to be aware of their surroundings and follow the rules of this article. Abductors look for routines. It’s a fact that there are many young women who have been abducted on their afternoon jog or walk or leaving work or during some other routine they carried out every day.
If your child doesn’t want to sit in the buggy seat…make them! Don’t let them run around the store to keep them happy. Don’t leave a toddler in the care of an older sibling. Kids get distracted and don’t always keep a watchful eye on the little ones. Often times we insist that our children are “polite” to the old lady or man or the single dad shopping with his child or whomever. Don’t make your children respond to the seemingly “friendly intrusions” into your time out in public. Don’t make your child feel obligated to respond. Do the talking for them. Make the stranger address you and then move on, always watching your surroundings.
We don’t like to discuss these things but as another poster said “better neurotic than missing, exploited or dead”. Words of wisdom.
Just a note to let reader know…my daughter was not kidnapped. She was grabbed by a man near the front door of our local grocery store and that man attempted to pull her with him and I grabbed her back to me. She was just a couple of feet away. She was grabbed around her chest as he came up behind her. She was five at the time. The man fled and a store clerk who had witnessed the incident ran after him and saw him get in to a waiting car in the parking lot. We called law enforcement and I filed a report and gave a description.
Thank you for all who have posted on this site. I have found so much useful information and tips to help me keep my children safer and smarter if ever caught in a situation we as parents all fear. I do plan to set up a family training class on ways we can use the tips given here on this site. Thank you and may you and your families be safe always.
I’m sorry but I wanted to give you a tip that you and your child may or may not know about is that if you have or somebody has a cell phone that isn’t in service or is out of prepaid minutes, you can almost always dial 911 from any cell phone and the call will be intercepted by police dispatch right away.
With the financial hardships a lot of families are facing right now it is common to have a cell phone and no service. I suggest keeping the phones charged and one with you at all times for any time you may need help. Another tip is that most if not all have a GPS system if turned on that can also help.
Suzanne, my outside opinion is that yelling “This isn’t my mommy/daddy!” would be more effective than yelling “You’re not my mommy/daddy!” Using “This isn’t…” makes it sound more like you’re calling it to everyone else’s attention. “You’re not…” still leaves open the possibility that this could be an aunt or an uncle that the child is having an argument with. It’s important for bystanders to be able to know that this is an abduction, because many bystanders will be reluctant to intercede if they’re not certain they should. Personally, if I heard someone say “You’re not my daddy!” I would start paying attention and I would watch them, but I wouldn’t physically interject until I was sure this wasn’t an uncle. If the child yelled out, “This isn’t my daddy!” I think I would physically intercede immediately. Just sounds more like a cry to others for help.