Man who impersonated a police officer and tried to kidnap a teenager was arrested

CINCINNATI (WKRC) – A local man is behind bars for impersonating a police officer and trying to kidnap a 14-year-old boy while he was waiting for the school bus.

After the neighbor and the bus driver intervened, the suspect went so far as to handcuff himself. The Fairfield freshman was waiting to be picked up for school in Tyler’s Creek around 7 a.m. Instead, a silver Chevrolet approached him.

The teenager said the man showed him a “fake badge” and arrested him without telling him why. He added that he saw his neighbor and started yelling at him.

He said he started feeling bad the moment he saw the man with the fake badge.

The person impersonating the police also gave a fake name and police identification number and said he was there to take the teenager to school.

“I was so scared, ‘Is this a hate crime? Is it a race crime? Is it sex trafficking? There’s a lot going on in this world, and if my neighbor wasn’t there, I might actually be gone,'” the 14-year-old boy said.

She said she screamed for her neighbor, Aarika Johnson, who ran out of the complex. He pulled over and confronted the suspect when the school bus arrived, he said.

“And I asked him, ‘What’s going on?’ “I asked. And he released him and I saw his hands were free. The man took his bag (and) walked towards my vehicle and I told the student to get in my car.”

The teenager said he never saw the suspect, who was identified as 36-year-old Bradley Pyles.

Johnson called the teen’s mother and met her at school.

“I was so happy. I literally cried tears of joy. I was so happy,” the young man said.

However, the young man’s mother and aunt said that with this relief, it was not possible for them to know about the kidnapping unless their neighbors called. They said the school incorrectly told them that Fairfield police were handling the investigation.

The boy’s aunt, Najah

A Fairfield Schools spokesperson said staff spoke with the student and parent early Friday morning and eventually referred them to Hamilton police.

Pyles has a criminal history of burglary and breaking and entering, but no past charges of kidnapping or impersonating an officer. Pyles is in the Butler County Jail on $3,500 bail.