13-Year-Old Girl Found Safe After Meeting 21-Year-Old Man; Two Arrested

A 13-year-old girl is home safe, and two people are in custody after the girl left her home to meet a 21-year-old man she had been communicating with online, according to the Rogers County Sheriff’s Office.

Deputies say the girl’s parents reported her missing earlier on Tuesday. Investigators learned the girl had been chatting with the man through Snapchat. Her phone was later found discarded in a trash can in Tulsa.

Rogers County Sheriff Scott Walton said deputies and Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers located the girl in a Broken Arrow neighborhood, where they also arrested the man and a woman.

The Department of Homeland Security says the case is supported by the Tornado Alley Child Exploitation Trafficking Task Force, which investigates online child predators.

Walton emphasized the risks young people face online.

“I think the lesson here to be learned is how much these young kids at such a vulnerable age — 13 — are chatting with people that they have no idea,” Walton said.

Investigators identified one of the suspects as Rose Blanchard. She was booked into jail on charges of harboring a runaway juvenile and obstructing an officer. Authorities have not disclosed her relationship to the male suspect.

The investigation is ongoing.