Firefighter charged in kidnap attack of girl
Shane Joseph McMichael was jailed on $2 million bail for breaking into a former neighbors home to allegedly beat and choke her.
A VOLUNTEER firefighter has been arrested on kidnapping charges after police said he broke into a Bucks County home Sunday night, locked an elderly couple in their bedroom and then tried to strangle the couple's underage granddaughter.
The attack ended only when the young victim recognized her old neighbor Shane Joseph McMichael, despite his black clothing and mask, and called out his name, police said.
The girl, 17, was able to persuade him to let her wash her face in the bathroom, during which he fled the home on Forrest Avenue near Bensalem Avenue in Bensalem's Cornwells Heights section, police said.
McMichael, 21, a volunteer firefighter with the Cornwells Fire Company who lives on Kirby Drive near Patrician in the Far Northeast, was charged with kidnapping, false imprisonment, assault, burglary, trespass and related offenses, Bensalem police said.
The girl told police that she was doing laundry just before 10 p.m. when she encountered a masked intruder in her kitchen. He immediately charged her, punched her repeatedly in the face, knocked her to the ground and began to strangle her while bashing her head into the floor, according to an affidavit. When she recognized him and called his name, the violence ended - but McMichael allegedly then insisted she come with him, investigators wrote in the affidavit.
The girl begged to first wash her face in the bathroom, investigators wrote. It was then, after hearing a noise upstairs, that McMichael allegedly fled, police said.
Afterward, the girl ran upstairs to her grandparents' room, where they had been trapped inside by a black rope that had been tied between the doorknob and a banister, police said.
After officers arrested him, McMichael confessed, saying "an impulse kicked in" when he left the Cornwells Fire Company at 9 p.m., and he drove to the victims' home, where he sneaked in through an unlocked, first-floor window, according to the affidavit.
Investigators found a gold Jeep in McMichael's driveway; inside in plain view were a .22-caliber rifle, black mask and black rope, police said.
Investigators haven't determined a motive for the attack.
McMichael was behind bars yesterday at Bucks County prison in lieu of $2 million bail.
On Twitter: @DanaDiFilippo
Blog: phillyconfidential.com