5 Hart High Students Arrested in Abduction

Five varsity football players at William S. Hart Union High School in Newhall were arrested on suspicion of kidnaping after allegedly forcing a 17-year-old girl into a van and abandoning her in a remote canyon, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department reported Wednesday.

In what deputies said appeared to be a prank that went out of control, the girl, a senior at the high school, suffered three minor cuts to her right leg when she tripped over a chain as she tried to run away from the boys.

The boys apparently were trying to send a message that they were angered by a series of pranks against them by girls at the school, Sgt. Greg Palmieri said. The kidnaped girl was not involved in those pranks, he said.

She suffered bruises on her arms and upper thighs when the boys grabbed her and forced her into the van, he said. She did not seek medical treatment, he said.

The boys were arrested Tuesday at the high school and were released to their parents pending the outcome of an investigation, Palmieri said.

The girl was in one of three cars that the boys chased early Saturday, Palmieri said. They cornered the girl’s car on Peachland Avenue in Newhall, took her to an unpaved portion of Pico Canyon Road west of the Golden State Freeway and forced her out, he said.

When the girl encountered their van again as she walked out of the canyon, the boys “realized what they had done and decided to do something to correct it,” he said, so they again forced her into the van and drove her to the house of one of her friends in Newhall.

Her father later contacted the sheriff’s station.