Mentally Disabled Texas Girl Found, Soldier Faces Charges
Aug. 19, 2011 — -- A missing 14-year-old girl with the mental capacity of someone much younger was found Friday morning with a 21-year-old soldier who now faces charges in her disappearance.
Police located Andrea Fox around 8:45 a.m. in Wichita Falls, Texas, in the car of James Dean Martin, an Army soldier stationed in Colorado, whom she knew from Timpson, Texas. Police had obtained text messages the two had exchanged in the hours before Fox disappeared Tuesday, which led them to believe she was with Martin. Helped by a tipster who had seen a description of Marin's car in the Amber Alert, police found the two asleep inside the vehicle that was parked on the side of a road.
"She's in good shape, she's unharmed and we're going to see her now," Fox's mother, Shanna Love, told ABCNews.com. Wichita Falls is approximately 600 miles from League City, where Fox was last seen while staying with her grandmother. Her grandmother reported her missing Tuesday morning when she found a note from the girl saying she was going to New York for a week, would return before school began and not to look for her.
State police issued the Amber Alert Thursday because of the risk posed by a 14-year-old girl with a diminished mental capacity traveling with someone unrelated who was more than three years older than she was.
"Certainly when you have someone who is young and is traveling with someone older, there is always a concern that they could be in danger of serious bodily harm, sexual assault or even death," said Tela Mange, a spokeswoman for the Texas state police.
Love said that her daughter had had no previous contact with Martin and was not the type of girl to run away.
Kristi Wyatt, a spokeswoman for League City, said that Martin would face charges of harboring a runaway. Both Fox and Martin are giving statements to police this morning, and then Fox will be released to her family, Wyatt said.
