Three Missouri women were arrested on Thursday after staging the kidnapping of a six-year-old to teach him a lesson about strangers.
The boy's mother, aunt, and grandmother admitted to setting up the crime, saying that the child was "too nice."
The aunt, 38-year-old Denise Kroutil, mother, Elizabeth Hupp, 25, and grandmother, Rose Brewer, 58, enlisted the assistance of 23-year-old Nathan Firoved to pull off the caper.
When the boy got off the school bus on Monday, Firoved lured him into a pickup truck. During the four-hour kidnapping, the man allegedly told the child he would never "see his mommy again," and he would be "nailed to the wall of a shed."
The Lincoln County Sheriff's Office reported that Firoved also brandished a weapon, bound the boy's hands and feet with plastic bags, put a jacket over his head, and threatened to hurt him if he didn't stop crying.
Kroutil reportedly pulled down her nephew's pants while he was being held captive in a basement, and threatened to sell him intro sex slavery. At the end of the ordeal, the boy was taken upstairs and lectured by his family on the dangers of trusting strangers.
"Family members told investigators their primary intent was to educate the victim and felt they did nothing wrong," the sheriff's statement said.
The adults were taken into custody after the boy reported the incident to officials at his school. The women and Firoved were charged with kidnapping, and Firoved was also charged with other felonies. They are being held on a $250,000 cash-only bond.
