Newsmaker

Alleged 'Barefoot Bandit' returns to the US

(Agencies)
Updated: 2010-07-14 11:47

The teenager claimed that he told islanders he was trying to get to Cuba so he could throw police off his trail, but he intended to make his way to the Turks and Caicos Islands southeast of the Bahamas, the officer said.

The suspect learned from the Internet that the British territory has a small police force and no marine defense force, according to the officer.

Harris-Moore spent Monday being questioned by investigators. Police Commissioner Ellison Greenslade described him as eloquent, calm, cooperative and "obviously a very intelligent young man," but declined to say whether he made any confession.

Related readings:  'Barefoot Bandit' nabbed after 2 years as fugitive

Kohler's older sister, Sandra Puttmann, of Arlington, was the first relative to hear from Harris-Moore after his arrest Sunday. She said he was "holding up" but scared now that he's in custody for the first time since he walked away from a halfway house south of Seattle.

Puttmann angrily criticized news stories about her nephew, saying reporters typically gloss over his difficult upbringing. She said police routinely accused him of stealing even when he hadn't and school officials didn't give him a chance - something police and school officials have adamantly denied.

Harris-Moore told a psychologist in 2008 that his mother was abusive when she'd been drinking, according to a court document cited Monday by The Herald newspaper of Everett. His father left when he was a toddler, and his stepfather died when he was 7, Kohler has said.

He is accused crimes in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska and Iowa.

The US Embassy in Nassau did not respond to queries about the timing of his deportation.

Emily Langlie, a spokeswoman for the US Attorney's Office in Seattle, said Tuesday she expected the US Marshals Service would fly Harris-Moore from Miami to Seattle, where he faces a federal complaint of interstate transportation of stolen property, alleging that he took a plane from Idaho and crashed it in Washington.

"Exactly when he would arrive here is a moving target as far as I know," she said.

McCartney reported from Nassau, Bahamas; Associated Press writer Gene Johnson contributed from Seattle, while AP writer Curt Anderson contributed from Miami.