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Missing New York Teen Found 'Safe And Sound' In London, Suspect Arrested, Police Say
Authorities believe 16-year-old Victoria Grabowski flew to London to visit an older man she met online. That man is now in custody.
A missing New York teen who may have been lured overseas by an older man was found safe and unharmed Wednesday in London, according to police.
Victoria Grabowski, 16, disappeared Saturday from her Maspeth home in Queens, sparking an international search for the teen after her family discovered a series of text messages between her and a British man.
NYPD Chief of Detectives Dermot Shea said in a press conference that authorities were able to track her down Wednesday, according to The New York Post.
“We’ll get her back here to her parents. She’s safe and sound,” he said. “She developed some sort of a relationship with a man … [and] got on a flight to London.”
The man is currently in custody and is being questioned by London officials, local station PIX 11 reports.
Grabowski reportedly met the man in question on Facebook and their relationship developed, according to The New York Daily News.
Her family discovered the teen was missing around noon Saturday after her father returned home from work. The teen’s uncle, Arkadiusz Grabowski, told the Post she had waited to catch the flight to London until her father left for work earlier that day.
“When he came back and found the door to the house open, right away he worried,” her uncle said. “It was unlocked. It [was] devastating.”
After discovering she was missing, her parents discovered the text messages between the pair. Arkadiusz Grabowski told QNS that they believed he was older after looking at one of the photos in the communication chain.
According to her uncle, the family had not noticed anything “unusual” in the days before she disappeared.
Authorities believe the teen was able to fly out of the country using her Polish passport.
