Kaylen Woodard, a 6-year-old from the South Side of Chicago, saved his 10-year-old neighbor from abduction by bravely fighting off the man who tried to snatch her away on Thursday evening.
It’s a story that could have had a tragic, heart-breaking ending, but Kaylen refused to let the stranger take his friend away without a fight.
Kaylen was playing outside with his neighbor, 10-year-old Marcy Jones, on Thursday when things took a turn for the worse.
As Marcy rode her scooter, a man approached her and put his hand over the young girl’s mouth.
The youngsters were only a feet away from their homes and Kaylen gave Marcy the chance she needed to run for it.
The 6-year-old hero told KMOV that he kicked the man several times, allowing Marcy to make a run for it.
“He tried to hold her mouth,” Kaylen explained. “The only way she got away is because I kicked him in the back of the leg and the outside of his leg.”
According to ABC 7, Marcy’s mother, Tracey Edwards, was checking on her daughter through the window when she spotted the little girl running frantically toward the house with her scooter in her hands.
“She came in the house and she was panting,” Edwards said. “And she was explaining that a man had grabbed her.”
The would-be kidnapper was already gone by the time Tracey went outside to try to find him.
Tracey says Kaylen is nothing short of a hero and she was “blessed that he was there.”
As for the little hero’s mother, she’s extraordinarily proud of her son.
“I can’t stop talking about him,” said Diane Blakely, Kaylen’s mother. “I’m still in a state of shock. Still by him being so young and he did that for a friend. That’s amazing.”
The Chicago Police Department described the would-be kidnapper as “a white or Hispanic male, 18 to 20 years old, has short black hair with light complexion.”
The police also said he was last seen driving a white convertible with red seats.
While the man has been able to elude capture so far, members of this South Side Chicago community are just thankful that he didn’t get away with an innocent little girl.
