Kidnapping reported at Blue Shield; T-Mobile helps police find victim

Lodi police are looking for a man who reportedly punched, beat and kidnapped a woman Monday morning in the parking lot of Blue Shield, 129 N. Guild Ave.

Officers chased a car driven by someone believed to be James Douglas, 20, throughout Stockton, thanks to a GPS system and cooperation by T-Mobile, which kept police updated on the location of the woman's cell phone, Officer Dale Eubanks said.

Officers responded to a kidnapping call from a Blue Shield employee at 9:06 a.m. The woman, a fairly new Blue Shield employee, had screamed for help, Eubanks said, but the man had driven away in the woman's car with her head pushed down.

After getting the woman's cell phone number from Blue Shield representative, Eubanks tried phoning her to find out where she was, but all he could hear was heavy breathing.

Using a Web site called "phone finder," Eubanks discovered that T-Mobile was the woman's cell phone provider. Law enforcement associates at T-Mobile gave Eubanks the longitude and latitude of the cell phone, and therefore the car.

It turned out that the car was at Monte Diablo Avenue and Interstate 5 in Stockton by about 10 a.m., but the car was gone by the time officers got there, Eubanks said.

However, Eubanks then got updates from T-Mobile every five minutes, and a detective in another car plugged the coordinates into the GPS system.

By 12:50 p.m., T-Mobile led officers to an apartment complex at 6465 N. West Lane, south of Hammer Lane. Eubanks said he found her car, and a neighbor told him which apartment the woman could be found.

As it turned out, the man, a transient from Stockton, Tracy and Oakland, left on foot about 10 minutes before officers arrived at the woman's apartment, Eubanks said.

Eubanks said he will search for the man today after he watches video of the incident this morning at Blue Shield.

Contact reporter Ross Farrow at rossf@lodinews.com.