A 26-year-old man who kid­napped his 17-year-old for­mer girl­friend and at­tacked her moth­er when she tried to in­ter­vene was held by po­lice min­utes af­ter the at­tack on Thurs­day night. Ac­cord­ing to po­lice re­ports, around 6.30 pm the man, from Jokhan Trace, Cara­po, Ari­ma, went to the teenag­er's home at Carib Cir­cu­lar, La Plat­ta Vil­lage, Va­len­cia, in a bid to rekin­dle their re­la­tion­ship.

Po­lice said the girl's 52-year-old moth­er in­ter­vened and ini­tial­ly stopped the man from en­ter­ing the house. Af­ter an ar­gu­ment with the woman, the sus­pect be­came en­raged and at­tacked her, knock­ing her un­con­scious. Armed with a shov­el he found in the fam­i­ly's yard, the sus­pect en­tered their house and con­front­ed his for­mer girl­friend.

Po­lice said he struck the young woman on the head with the shov­el be­fore drag­ging her out­side and in­to his car, which was parked near­by. Rel­a­tives con­tact­ed po­lice and the North­ern and East­ern Task Force re­spond­ed. Af­ter a brief car chase, the po­lice in­ter­cept­ed the sus­pect's ve­hi­cle on the Churchill-Roo­sevelt High­way, Waller Field.

They ar­rest­ed him and res­cued the school­girl, who was locked in the trunk of the car. The girl and her moth­er were tak­en to the Ari­ma Health Fa­cil­i­ty, where the girl was treat­ed for a large gash to her face which she suf­fered when she was hit with the shov­el. The young woman re­mained hos­pi­talised up to late yes­ter­day. Her moth­er was treat­ed for mi­nor in­juries and dis­charged.

The sus­pect re­mained de­tained at the San­gre Grande Po­lice Sta­tion up to yes­ter­day evening un­der in­ter­ro­ga­tion. He is ex­pect­ed to be charged with kid­nap­ping, as­sault and wound­ing with in­tent. Se­nior Supt Di­anand Naipaul and Supt Hen­dron Moses of the East­ern Di­vi­sion are prob­ing the in­ci­dent.