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To: hergus
Some details from the local WV paper, I hope this isn't a duplicate post that I missed:

"The Journal: Martinsburg, West Virginia

Fugitive found

The man wanted for questioning in connection with a June 5 Salt Lake City kidnapping checked into City Hospital under an assumed name, the victim of an apparent drug overdose.

The Martinsburg Journal
6/21/2002
MARTINSBURG, WV - Local police and FBI agents were tight-lipped Friday evening about the man who was wanted for questioning in a Utah kidnapping and checked into City Hospital early Thursday morning.

Bret Michael Edmunds, 26, walked into the emergency room Thursday at approximately 5:15 a.m. using a false name, according to City Hospital spokeswoman Teresa McCabe. He suffered from liver damage caused by an apparent drug overdose, she said. He was alone, according to hospital staff.

He was admitted to the intensive care unit around 10:30 a.m. Hospital nurses in the ICU unit, became suspicious and contacted the FBI Friday afternoon after Edmunds gave inconsistent information. FBI agents identified the drifter around 3 p.m. and arrested him.

Three other patients who were in ICU at the same time as Edmunds were transferred to another part of the hospital, McCabe said. Eight or nine U.S. marshals and West Virginia State Police troopers stood guard on the locked-down unit. FBI agents have questioned Edmunds and hospital staff, according to McCabe. Edmunds faded in and out of consciousness Friday, officials said.

"He still needs medical care," McCabe said. "As long as he's here, he'll remain under guard."

FBI officials said Edmunds will not be moved until his condition stabilizes. At presstime, he was listed in serious condition.

Late Friday afternoon, state police and FBI agents roped off a portion of City Hospital's front parking lot, leaving only a dark-green Saturn with Washington plates believed to be Edmunds' car in a row of 13 spaces. An FBI agent wearing rubber gloves opened the trunk, revealing clothes and other items stuffed inside. State troopers took photos of the car before a worker with Big K's Towing hauled it from the parking lot. News helicopters hovered overhead and TV trucks were set up in the parking lot.

Police declined to release information on what Edmunds may have been doing in Martinsburg.

Reporters from several major networks converged in an eighth-floor conference room to interview McCabe. Cable news shows, including Larry King Live, CNN and Fox News, called to speak with her.

"This is probably the biggest thing that's happened at City Hospital," McCabe said.

Authorities across the country had been looking for Edmunds, a transient living out of his Saturn, because a Salt Lake City milkman remembered seeing him near Elizabeth Smart's home two days before the teen was kidnapped. The milkman recalled part of the license plate number of EdmundsĀ¹ car and passed it along to police.

Those plates, stolen from another car, were found last week along a road north of Salt Lake City.

Edmunds was being held on a federal warrant charging him with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution for violating probation in Utah on charges unrelated to the Smart case. He has been considered a fugitive since October.

"He is still not a suspect at this time," said Salt Lake City Police Chief Rick Dinse. "HeĀ¹s a question mark and we want to put a period on that question mark."

Federal and state officers will question Edmunds if they get a chance and others are being sent from Salt Lake City, Dinse said in a press conference in Utah.

Smart was taken from her bedroom. Her 9-year-old sister, Mary Katherine, described the kidnapper as a 5-foot-8 man.

Edmunds is 6-foot-2 and 235 pounds.

As soon as Edmunds is medically able, he will be taken to a magistrate for a hearing. Edmunds will then be taken to Utah "forthwith."

A $250,000 reward created by family, friends and community is being offered for the safe return of Elizabeth Smart. Anyone with information is asked to call 1-800-932-0190."








39 posted on 06/22/2002 2:21:56 PM PDT by hergus
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To: hergus
More from the same paper:

"The Journal: Martinsburg, West Virginia

Drifter's capture draws spectators

City Hospital visitors theorized about the role a drifter wanted for questioning by the FBI might have had in a Utah kidnapping case that has gained national attention.

By DANIEL FRIEND
Journal Staff Writer
MARTINSBURG - National news media and curious spectators descended on City Hospital Friday, after police confirmed a wanted Utah fugitive was in the intensive care unit.

"We just hope and pray for the (Elizabeth Smart) family, like we have for the past several weeks," said Dry Run Road resident Pete Moats, who drove to the hospital "to see what was going on."
Moats added, "Maybe West Virginia can help find the little girl."

As the nationally covered televison and radio news of 26-year-old Bret Edmunds' presence here filtered through the community, some residents walked or drove to the hospital to find out more.

"That's what we're here for - we're nosy," said Bobby Crase, a resident of the Martin's Landing apartment complex just across from the hospital on Dry Run Road. He walked to the parking lot with his mother, Linda Crase.

"This is going to be the talk of the town for a while, seeing as how he made it all the way from Utah to Martinsburg," Bobby Crase said. Martinsburg is nearly 1,800 miles from Salt Lake City. "I'll bet people are relieved now that the guy's caught. The father's all over the news ... sobbing, wanting to find his daughter."

Police stressed that Edmunds has not been named as a suspect in the kidnapping of 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart, but is a fugitive wanted for questioning.

Moats drove to the hospital with his son and looked on as police examined and photographed a green Saturn, reportedly Edmunds', which was cordoned off with yellow police tape in the parking lot.

"I think it's great because the West Virginia hospital and the police got together and figured it out," Moats said. "Maybe West Virginia can help find the little girl. ... I think he could supply some vital information. ... All of a sudden, he drives clean across the country ... then he gives a bogus name at our hospital."

A hospital employee who works in radiology said he saw Edmund's chest X-ray when he hung it up for a doctor, although he didn't know whose X-ray it was at the time. When he heard that Edmunds was in the hospital, he looked up his name but didn't find anything.

"But then I heard he was using a different name and then I found it," he said. "I had hung it up for the doctor (earlier). He put all the stickers on it. It's a little piece of history, but not the kind I want to be known for."

Hospital Security Cpl. R. Perrell manned the front entrance of the hospital and escorted reporters to an eighth-floor conference room where hospital spokeswoman Teresa McCabe released information about Edmunds.

Some hospital employees were asked to move their cars away from the area where the Saturn had been parked, before police ordered it removed as evidence.

"Everybody is looking around seeing this and that ... and they're starting to wonder," Perrell said Friday afternoon.

As a nurse walked toward her vehicle to go home, a man called out: "Bet you all didn't bargain on this today, did you?"

Moats said, "(Edmunds) knows something or he wouldn't have high-tailed it clean across the country - do you think?"

At King's New York Pizza, at the intersection of Dry Run and Tavern roads, Patty Hess was surprised to hear Edmunds had been captured here.

"As long as they can keep him contained, I'm
satisfied and happy," Hess said. "The man could die before anything else happens." McCabe said police want to transfer Edmunds to a more secure hospital for more questioning and evidence collection."


41 posted on 06/22/2002 2:23:18 PM PDT by hergus
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