CORONAVIRUS (COVID-19) RESOURCE CENTER Read More
Add To Favorites

Missouri woman accused of attempted abduction needs mental health treatment, family says

St. Louis Post-Dispatch (MO) - 10/13/2015

Oct. 13--STE. GENEVIEVE, Mo. -- A Perryville, Mo., woman faces charges after police say she attempted to kidnap three girls who were walking in Ste. Genevieve on Sunday afternoon.

Cynthia Lou Wofford, 53, of the 1900 block of Highway B, was charged with three counts of attempted kidnapping and assault. She is jailed on a $50,000 bail.

Her older brother, Steven Cook, said Tuesday that Wofford has a mental illness and has been off her medication after a breakup with her boyfriend.

"The last few days, she's been out of it," Cook said, "and I'd like to think she wouldn't have hurt the girls."

The girls, two sisters and a friend who were 12 and 13 years old, told Ste. Genevieve police they were walking back from McDonald's on the sidewalk by Highway M on Sunday when they saw a blue pickup drive across the road and onto the grass, nearly hitting them.

It appeared the driver was trying to block their path, they said.

The driver, later identified as Wofford, told them, "My name is Cindy. You guys need to trust me." She said she had just left a church in Tennessee and was a preacher. She also told them that her mother had died years ago, and then told them about three girls who looked just like them who "died on this same day, at this time, right where we were standing," according to court documents. She said she needed help finding the girls who looked like them.

She also told them she was looking for a girl who went missing in Fredericktown, Mo., referring to Gina Dawn Brooks, who went missing in 1989 at age 14 and has not been found.

A bystander who knew the girls saw them talking to the woman, and walked up to them. Wofford pulled away, and the girls ran to the home of the two sisters, crying and shaking.

The father of the sisters ran outside and saw Wofford, stopped her, and told her he was going to call police. She drove away as he hung onto the truck. He jumped off, and police caught up with her about eight miles away near Route N and Interstate 55.

Wofford told the sergeant who pulled her over that she had been trying to educate the girls about the Gina Dawn Brooks case. He found a utility knife with the blade exposed on the pickup's floor board, as well as two plastic tarps in their original packaging. There were two shovels and other tools in the bed of the truck.

"It was so creepy," one of the girls told police. "She had like a shovel and some tarp in her back."

Wofford also had pink and purple duct tape on her tailgate, police say. Words on the tape said "Royal" and "Girls," and writing on the side of the truck said, "Happy Day Cindy Cindy." Police weren't sure what the writing meant but they thought it was put there to make the truck more enticing to children, according to court documents.

Later, when Ste. Genevieve Police Chief Eric Bennett interviewed Wofford, she thanked him for investigating. During an interview, where she often rambled, she said, "And I'm a mom, and I apologize ... I don't apologize for being a mom, I apologize for loving too much, and caring for people too much."

Cook, the brother of Wofford, told the Post-Dispatch that the Gina Dawn Brooks case is on the minds of many in his community and that his sister was no different. He said his sister had nothing to do with Gina's disappearance but was concerned whenever she would see young girls walking alone or in small groups.

"I imagine she was trying to help the girls," Cook said of the Sunday incident.

He said Wofford had mentioned the Gina Dawn Brooks case to other youngsters.

"She'd be babysitting and she'll go talking about it and scare the kids," Cook said.

Wofford's youngest sister, Sharon Jones, was a teenager when Gina Dawn Brooks disappeared and moved out of the family home about the same time.

"Gina Dawn going missing has played on her mind ever since," Jones said. "Anytime she sees a teenage girl on the street by themselves she yells at them to be safe, and she follows them around to make sure nobody is messing with them. It freaks people out, but that's the way she handles it."

The tarp, the shovel, the duct tape? Jones said it might seem scary, but Wofford would carry all sorts of miscellaneous items in her vehicle because she essentially lived out of her truck.

Wofford had been a district manager at a Hardee's, but quit after becoming pregnant and post-partum depression set in, Jones said. Her mental illness made keeping a job difficult, she said.

Wofford had been hospitalized in the past for her mental illness, her brother said. She was supposed to be seeing a counselor once a week, although Cook doesn't know if she did. He said he is the guardian to handle Wofford's finances. He said she is the mother of two adult children. He said state laws make it hard for relatives to get a mentally ill person off the streets. The fact that she's in custody isn't a bad thing, he said.

"I'm concerned about her when society can't do anything (with her) until something like this happens," Cook said. "She doesn't belong in jail. She belongs in a mental institution."

Jones said, "This all boils down to mental health awareness. We have been trying to get her into a boarding home for more than a year to remind her to take her medicine and to remind her to eat."

Wofford's brother and sister say they hope to visit her in jail soon but haven't talked with her since her arrest. Jones has talked to the jail nurse to insist Wofford get medication. They say they didn't know if she had a lawyer representing her yet in this case. The court file does not list an attorney.

Valerie Schremp Hahn -- 314-340-8246

@valeriehahn on Twitter

vhahn@post-dispatch.com

___

(c)2015 the St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Visit the St. Louis Post-Dispatch at www.stltoday.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.