A 4-year-old girl who was abducted by her parents in 2019 after they lost custody of her has been found alive in a makeshift room beneath a set of stairs in her grandfather’s house. Kim Cooper and Kirk Shultis Jr. lost custody of young Paislee Shultis but stole her away from her legal guardian in Cayuga Heights, New York. They’ve been hiding the girl from police ever since, the Daily Mail reports.
- Police were tipped off to Paislee’s presence in the home. After receiving a call from a concerned party, officers from Saugerties Police visited the property where they found the child hiding in a dark, wet “room” under a staircase. The home where she was found was more than 150 miles away from where she was abducted in 2019.
- The girl’s parents and paternal grandfather have been arrested. However, Shultis and his father, who ere charged with endangering the welfare of a child, were released on bond soon after. Cooper remains in custody at the Ulster County Jail and faces the same charges as listed above as well as an additional, unnamed count. None of the parties have been charged with kidnapping.
- Saugerties Detective Erik Thiele detailed his experiencing discovering Paislee at the residence in a statement. He said that the “noticed something about the staircase leading from the back of the residence into the basement of the house that caught his attention.” After shining a flashlight inito the stairs, detective noticed a child’s feet. “After removing several more steps, the child and her abductor were discovered within.”
- Paislee appeared to be in good health after an examination. However, officers were grateful to the tipster to exposed her whereabouts. “We believe… somebody informed the parents that the older child had been picked up by the legal guardian and by county officials at the time and that caused the parents then to take Paislee and flee,” Saugerties Police Chief Joseph Sinagra told WNYT.
