This is the shocking footage that will send a chill through parents around Australia: a seven-year-old girl lured away from her family at a busy Kmart by a predator.
WATCH THE SHOCKING VIDEO BELOW
Queensland man Sterling Free told his victim to follow him from Kmart North Lakes in Brisbane, where she had been Christmas shopping with her mother. This frightening CCTV footage shows her trailing the man, after he approached her in the toy aisle at the popular store, asking her to come with him.
He then drove the girl to a secluded area in nearby bushland where he assaulted her. About 90 minutes later he returned the girl to the shopping centre, where her terrified mother had alerted staff to her disappearance.
Free, 26, who is a father to twin girls, has pleaded guilty to taking the child for ‘immoral purposes, deprivation of liberty and indecent treatment’.
He is remanded in custody and will be sentenced in October.
