The 13-year-old son of John and Tara Farrell and a 12-year-old friend were walking in Brooklyn Park one August night when a Cadillac Escalade sped up and the driver ordered them inside.
The man drove to his nearby house, sat the frightened boys on a curb, and slapped handcuffs on them. Only then did they learn that they had been placed under citizen's arrest by off-duty Minneapolis police officer Tony Adams, whose doorbell had been rung earlier by someone who fled and who had heard from neighbors that teens might be breaking into vehicles in the area.
The Farrells, who had called 911 about their missing son and had been frantically searching for him, didn't learn the identity of the man they believed had abducted the boys for at least 10 minutes.