Screenshot via Broward County Sheriff’s Office video
Audio By Carbonatix
A Florida man has been arrested after allegedly carjacking a mother, driving off with her child, and then abandoning the toddler on the side of the road.
On Sunday, the Broward County Sheriff’s Office (BSO) arrested 35-year-old Willio Petioma after an anonymous tip identified him as the person seen on surveillance video leaving a 3-year-old child in a car seat on the roadside after allegedly carjacking the child’s mother in Fort Lauderdale.
Petioma was booked into BSO’s Main Jail on charges of kidnapping, carjacking, interfering with custody of a minor, and illegal use of a credit card.
The incident occurred at around 8:30 a.m. on June 26 after police received a call about a stolen car in Oakland Park, according to the sheriff’s office. A mother and her young daughter were involved in a car crash with another vehicle.
But when the mother stepped out of her car to exchange information with the other driver, a man jumped inside her car and drove off with her toddler still inside, according to police.
Police say the woman clung to the car’s door and shouted that her child was in the back seat as the man sped away and briefly dragged her.
Surveillance video obtained by the sheriff’s office shows a man later exiting the vehicle, holding a child in the car seat and leaving it on the sidewalk before Good Samaritans rush to the toddler’s side.
It also captures the man ditching the car and using the woman’s credit card at a Family Dollar store.
Petioma was also arrested on a Palm Beach County warrant for possession of cocaine and resisting an officer.
He remains in jail on a roughly $50,000 bond.
