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Breaking News

Abducted Boy Still Missing

Aired August 28, 2002 - 14:09   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: We are going to move now to southern California, where we are listening on the missing boy case, 9-year-old Nicholas Farber.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Approximately 20 minutes, at 11:30 -- again, at 11:30 Captain Pat McManus, chief of police of the Palm Desert station, along with members from other entities that are involved in this investigation, again at 11:30, will be out here to go over this incident and answer questions.

That is all at this time. Thank you.

Again, those will come out at 11:30. Thank you.

PHILLIPS: Still no motive and no suspect and no trace of 9-year- old Nicholas Farber, the little boy that was abducted from his home this morning in southern California. We thought we were going to have information there from the sheriff's department in Riverside with regard to the missing boy case; however, that is not going to happen. We will get information to you, though, as soon as they do bring new details.

Our John Vause is following this story that has happened out of Palm Desert.

John, are you with us live or are you with us by phone?

OK, he is with us live.

John, can you hear me OK?

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, hi, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: I know this is all happening quickly. Go ahead and get your things together and any information that you have and let us know what happened there. We expected a news conference.

VAUSE: Yes, we were expecting a news conference at the top of the hour. One of the sheriff's deputies came out and told us that has been delayed for about another 20 or so minutes.

He did hand us out this composite sketch of what one of the suspects looked like. I will just get (UNINTELLIGIBLE), my cameraman, to zoom in there and get a tight shot of this. Just to recap what happened, at 2:00 local time -- that's about nine hours ago now -- two men broke into the home of Nicholas Farber. One of them the sheriffs say looks like this man here. They were in fact wearing stockings over their head. That was at least the initial report.

When they had -- there was a scuffle with the boy's father. He was beaten. He was taken to hospital. He was treated for bruises to the head, to the chest. He spent several hours in hospital. He was released a few hours later.

By that time, of course, the boy was many hours gone. The 9- year-old boy, about 4 1/2 feet tall, with brown hair and blonde highlights.

A fairly intensive police search followed.

Now, some confusion then followed after that. There was reports of an Amber Alert had been issued and then had been taken back, that the statewide Amber Alert was never, in fact, issued. that it was more of a local alert for a missing child.

We heard from sources just a short time ago that this may in fact be some kind of custody dispute. That would fit in with information that we have been told here from the Palm Desert Police, that in fact the mother does not live in the house, that she does not live locally. In fact, that she may in fact live outside of the state and that they are now trying to contact her. There are some reports that she may live in Colorado Springs, in Colorado. It's all part of a custody battle between the boy's father and the mother. They are, obviously, still talking with the father at this stage.

The FBI had been called in. We are expecting to hear from them in about 15 minutes from now, Kyra. So we're hoping for some more details about just what's been happening here in the last nine hours, and of course, nine hours is a very long time in any abduction. This boy could be anywhere by now -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Our John Vause reporting there from southern California on the case of the missing 9-year-old boy.

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