Texano pleads guilty to kidnapping 13-year-old girl in California

A Texan has pleaded guilty to kidnapping a 13-year-old girl in Southern California after a passerby yelled at her to “help!” Such a sign was seen holding. In a parked car.

Steven Robert Sablan, 62, of Cleburne, Texas, admitted in a plea agreement that he sexually assaulted the victim while driving her from Texas to California, according to a statement issued Friday by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California.

The girl was rescued on July 9 in Long Beach, south of Los Angeles, after a passerby called 911 and found her holding a piece of paper with a handwritten plea for help.

Sablan, who has been in federal custody since July 2023, pleaded guilty to one count of kidnapping, prosecutors said.

His attorney, public defender Nadine Hettle, declined to comment Saturday.

In July, Sablan was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of kidnapping and transporting a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity.

An FBI agent wrote in an affidavit in support of the criminal complaint that the girl was walking on a San Antonio street on July 6 when Sablan approached her in his vehicle, pointed a black handgun at her and told her: “If you don’t, you get in the car with me, I will hurt you.”

His sentencing hearing was scheduled for October 25. Sablan faces a minimum sentence of 20 years in federal prison and a maximum of life in prison.