Abdulrahman Abohatem, a gas station employee in Detroit, Michigan, has recently saved a 16-year-old girl from a male kidnapper with a history of s*xual violations.
The offender approached and abducted the teen just after 7 a.m. on Monday, April 13, 2026, near Edwin and Brombach in Hamtramck.
He was taken into custody thanks to the police’s swift response and Abohatem’s quick thinking.
Highlights
- A 16-year-old girl was kidnapped by a suspect with a firearm in Detroit, Michigan, while waiting for the school bus.
- A gas station staff member intervened after the girl called for help and assisted the police in arresting the kidnapper.
- The girl’s friends collaborated with the police to track her down by pin-pointing her location via social media, said the school principal.
“I hope everyone remembers his name for being a hero,” one user said about his actions.
Kidnapped 16-year-old mouthed “help” to gas station employee Abdulrahman Abohatem
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The girl, a student at Frontier International Academy, was waiting for her school bus when the kidnapping took place.
The suspect had a firearm with him, which he used to scare her. It was recovered by the cops during his arrest.
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Around 30 minutes later, at 7:30 a.m., he brought the girl to a Sunoco gas station store at the corner of Nevada Street and Conant.
Abdulrahman Abohatem, who was managing the counter at the time, told WXYZ that the suspect asked for c*garettes and told the girl to pay for them. When she approached the counter, she silently asked for help.
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“When he asked her to pay for the c*gartte, I said, 'Stop. There's something wrong.' And she mouthed, and talked to me with no sound, ‘Help,’” he said.
Noticing the girl’s plea for help, he came out from behind the plexiglass and asked the kidnapper to leave while ushering the girl to safety.
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“I go out, I kick him out, I ask the girl to go behind me,” he said.
In a surveillance video from the gas station, obtained by ABC News, Abohatem can be seen stepping between the girl and the suspect and forcing the man outside.
Image credits: ABC News
At this point, the police had arrived at the gas station parking lot by tracking the girl’s phone location.
“I see the police outside. I point to him. I go, that's the guy,” Abohatem added. “I feel good when you save somebody. Sixteen years old — she is a child.”
The suspect was taken into custody immediately.
The teen’s friend helped the police find her, said the school principal
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Frontier International Academy principal Mohammed Alsanai revealed that several of her friends witnessed the kidnapping and alerted the authorities. One of them also helped the police track the girl’s location.
“One of her friends opened the location through one of the social media apps,” the principal told ABC News. “I said, 'Oh, I could see her location right now,’”
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“As we showed the police the location, informed the dispatch, and as she walked in and said she had the location, like the whole room froze, and we all looked at each other like, ‘Here we go.’”
The investigators in the case also confirmed this at a press conference.
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Hamtramck Police Chief Hussein Farhat declared the kidnapping was random, and the kidnapper does not currently pose a threat to the community. The suspect and the teen did not know each other.
Since the abductee was a juvenile, the police refused to share too many details about the case.
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The suspect is currently detained, and charges are pending with the Wayne County Prosecutors' Office.
The police have not yet indicated what charges he will face. He is scheduled to appear in the 31st District Court.
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Kidnapping in Michigan is a felony punishable by up to life in prison, or any term of years, along with fines of up to $50,000.
Hamtramck Mayor urged parents to have a clear conversation with their kids about personal safety
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Following the incident, Hamtramck Mayor Abdulmalik Algahaim shared the publicly available details on Facebook.
“As in any instance that threatens the safety of our children, it is very important that they know what to do,” he wrote at the end of it.
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“Please speak with your children on a daily basis about their day to see if anything has happened that would cause alarm.”
According to the Child Crime Prevention and Safety Center, a child goes missing or is abducted every 40 seconds in the United States.
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Approximately 840,000 children are reported missing each year, the Federal Bureau of Investigation estimates.
While most reports of missing or abducted children are resolved within hours, many involve situations where a juvenile goes missing permanently or for an extended period of time.
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The AMBER Alert system, a collaborative effort by the media, cell service providers, state transportation services, and local police, serves as a nationwide emergency broadcast system that quickly spreads messages to find kidnapped children.
AMBER, which stands for America’s Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response, was created to honor Amber Hagerman, a nine-year-old girl who was a victim of kidnapping and homicide in Arlington, Texas.
"Thank god for this man." The internet praised Abdulrahman Abohatem for saving the girl with quick thinking
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