Deputies found Daniel Francis Gear in woods along U.S. 421 after the 12-year-old girl escaped and was taken to safety.
HARNETT COUNTY, N.C. — Deputies searching wooded stretches near U.S. Highway 421 found a man accused of kidnapping a 12-year-old girl hours after the child escaped, reached the roadside and was helped by a driver, ending an Aug. 16 search that had prompted an armed-and-dangerous warning.
Daniel Francis Gear, 38, was arrested Sunday night after authorities found his vehicle but initially could not find him, Harnett County Sheriff Wayne Coats said. Gear was charged with first-degree kidnapping and assault on a female. By then, the girl had already been taken to a hospital and was safe. The two developments unfolded on different tracks: deputies were trying to locate the missing suspect while investigators began piecing together what happened to the child between the Lillington home she had been visiting and the highway where she ultimately reached help.
Authorities said the incident began at a home where the girl was spending time with a friend. Gear lived near or was connected to that household, according to sheriff officials and local reports, but Coats said Gear did not have a relationship with the girl herself. The sheriff’s office said Gear took the child from the Lillington residence. Court documents later alleged that he restrained and moved a child younger than 16 without a parent or guardian’s consent. Investigators have not announced a motive, and the girl’s identity has been withheld because she is a minor and alleged crime victim.
Her safe recovery sharply changed the nature of the operation. Instead of searching for both a child and an accused abductor, deputies knew the girl was alive and could concentrate on finding Gear. Officials located his vehicle in the area around U.S. 421 but did not find him inside or nearby during the initial check. The sheriff’s office warned that he should be considered armed and dangerous while deputies searched. Local reports said the effort stretched for roughly seven hours before law enforcement found Gear in a wood line along the highway Sunday evening.
The girl’s route to safety became clearer through the account of Jennifer Maxwell, who happened to be driving home from work in the area that afternoon. Maxwell told WRAL she noticed a young girl emerging from the trees and moving down the roadside embankment. The child ended up in the ditch, crying. Maxwell did not initially know what had happened. She turned around, pulled near the girl and asked whether she was OK. The answer changed an ordinary drive home into part of an active kidnapping investigation: Maxwell said the child told her she had been kidnapped.
Maxwell described the girl as barefoot and scratched on her arms and legs. She called 911 and helped get her away from the roadside. During their conversation, Maxwell said, the girl described having spent the night at a friend’s home before Gear woke her and told her to get into his truck. According to Maxwell’s retelling, the girl said Gear later drove to a wooded location and made her walk for an extended period while pushing her and grabbing her shoulder. Maxwell said the girl described walking for a couple of hours before she eventually escaped.
Not every detail of that account appears in the public charging documents. The Harnett County warrant focuses on legal elements: prosecutors allege Gear unlawfully restrained the girl, moved her without permission and did so for the purpose of terrorizing her. The document further alleges that she was not released in a safe place. An assault accusation says Gear pushed the girl to the ground and physically restrained her. The more extensive narrative about the truck and time in the woods was reported through Maxwell’s account of what the child said after reaching the highway.
After Maxwell contacted authorities, she took the girl to the Erwin Police Department and later helped officers identify the area where she had found her, according to local reporting. Gear’s vehicle was located nearby. That gave deputies a geographic focus even though he was no longer with the vehicle. The search extended through wooded terrain along the highway until deputies found him that evening. Reports describing the operation said officers used a range of search resources, while the sheriff’s public warning urged people not to approach Gear themselves.
The arrest ended the immediate public-safety search but began the court process. Gear was booked on the felony kidnapping charge and misdemeanor assault charge. A judge later set a $2.5 million secured bond, according to court reporting, and ordered conditions including no contact with the girl if Gear were released. Reports also said the court barred him from being alone with any person younger than 18 while on release. A probable-cause hearing was initially placed on the calendar for Sept. 1. The reliable public reports reviewed here do not document a final outcome of that scheduled hearing.
At the same time, sheriff officials reported that the girl had left the hospital and was recovering with her family. Authorities have not disclosed detailed medical findings. Maxwell said the girl had visible scratches and no shoes when she appeared from the woods, but public reporting does not establish a serious long-term injury. Keeping those accounts separate is important: Maxwell described what she personally saw at the roadside, while the hospital’s evaluation has remained private and investigators have released only limited information about the child’s condition.
Residents interviewed after the arrest described uncertainty about Gear even though he lived in the area. Some said they recognized the girl because of her friendship with a child in the household but knew little about the adult now facing charges. Those neighborhood accounts illustrate how quickly the law-enforcement response disrupted an otherwise residential area, but they do not provide evidence about Gear’s alleged conduct. Investigators have not publicly offered an explanation for why they believe the child was taken or identified any planning that may have preceded the alleged kidnapping.
Maxwell’s involvement also continued after the girl’s recovery. She told WRAL that after helping police and giving a statement, she was involved in a car wreck near the police station. She later went to the hospital, where she encountered the child and her parents. Maxwell said the family thanked her and that she was relieved to see the girl well enough to leave. The second encounter came after the emergency roadside moment that had put the recovery operation in motion and before the broader criminal investigation became public through court records.
The search itself remains one of the defining features of the case because authorities had two pieces of information that pointed toward the same corridor: Gear’s unattended vehicle and the place where the girl reached the highway. Deputies ultimately found him in wooded terrain along U.S. 421. Public reports have not explained what Gear allegedly did between the girl’s escape and his arrest, whether he knew authorities had recovered her or why he was in the woods when officers located him. Those details remain outside the verified public record reviewed for this article.
The criminal case is therefore narrower than some early descriptions of the manhunt might suggest. Gear is accused in court records of first-degree kidnapping and assault on a female, and those charges remain allegations. No verified final disposition was found in the reporting reviewed as of Sept. 28. The girl, meanwhile, was reported safe and back with her family after an episode that moved rapidly from a missing-child investigation to a highway search and, finally, an arrest in the woods.
Author note: Last updated September 28, 2026.