Child safe, mother charged with kidnapping after Amber Alert

DURHAM, NC — Durham police have found both a missing child and his mother, who is believed to have abducted him Thursday.

Police said 9-year-old Geon King-Parriett and his biological mother, Mariah King, were seen walking away from 202 South Benjamine St. around 6 p.m. Thursday. They issued an Amber Alert for Geon just before 11 p.m.

At 1:30 p.m. Friday, Geon was found safe and sound and Mariah King was in police custody. Officers found the couple in the 2200 block of South Roxboro Street.

Mariah King, 33, was charged with child abduction and issued two warrants for failure to appear in court. She was arrested for violating probation. She is being held in the Durham County Jail on $70,000 bail.

Partial alarm preceded Amber Alert

Two alerts were sent out on Thursday at 10:48 p.m. and 11:26 p.m. Some North Carolina residents were confused by the first alert, which read, “Activate WEA in Region 6.”

The AMBER alert system was launched in 1996 after 9-year-old Amber Hagerman was kidnapped and brutally murdered in Texas. AMBER stands for America’s Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response.

After Hagerman’s murder, Dallas-Fort Worth broadcasters and local police developed an early warning system to track abducted children. The warning system was later adopted by other states across the country.