The caller said he was from Texas and was watching a girl in Naples on a Webcam who was threatening to kill herself with a knife.
When that call came into the Collier County Sheriff’s Office Communications Center at 2:31 a.m. Friday, Supervisor Justin Koval immediately contacted Special Crimes Bureau Investigator Scott Rapisarda, who was at home asleep.
Koval set up a three-way telephone call between himself, Rapisarda and the caller from Texas.
The caller told them he had been chatting with a 17-year-old girl via Webcam when the girl displayed a knife and held it up to her throat and arms and threatened to kill herself. The man did not know girl’s location, only that she said she was from the Naples area. He called CCSO because he was concerned for her safety.
Based on the information the man provided, Rapisarda was able to locate the Web site, create an account and track down the girl’s screen name. When he saw the girl on the Webcam, he instant-messaged her and began a private conversation with her over the Internet, posing as a young girl in an effort to gather information on her whereabouts.
Every piece of information Rapisarda gathered he passed onto Koval, who had remained on the phone. Koval ran each lead through a variety of law enforcement and public databases in an attempt to locate the girl, but none panned out.
After an hour and a half Rapisarda got the break he needed.
The girl told him she lived within walking distance of a clubhouse in an East Naples community.
Rapisarda was able to narrow down the location and deputies were dispatched to a house, where the girl, who was actually 12, was living with her grandparents. Deputies found a knife next to a computer.
The girl was taken to a local health center for evaluation.
