Arizona moving crew spots missing 2-year-old girl at QuikTrip, blocks kidnappers with truck until police arrive

An Arizona moving crew sprung into action on Sunday morning after spotting a child at a gas station who matched the description of a girl who had been reported missing. An Amber alert had been issued on Saturday for 2-year-old Kehlani Rogers, who had last been seen at her family’s home near 119th Avenue and West Thomas Road in Avondale on Friday night.

Rogers had been found by authorities after tipsters reported a possible sighting of the girl and 23-year-old Marina Noriega, with whom the girl was last seen, at a Phoenix QuikTrip. A crew from Camelback Moving had stopped at the gas station to grab food and drinks for the day when a security guard told one of the foremen of the situation. The guard had called the police, saying that the little girl may have been found.

The moving crew was heard in a video taken inside their truck discussing the little girl. "Oh my God, that’s her," one of the movers said, as they discussed the description that had been sent out by police in the Amber Alert.

Referring to the pickup truck that the woman and the girl arrived at the gas station in, the driver of the moving truck said, "should I block them?" Another mover replied, "you should block them."

They used the truck to block in Noriega’s vehicle until police arrived. Foremen Ralph Vollmert and Kevin Place told Fox 10, "Our trucks are 28, 30 feet long, so we knew it was a good idea to put the truck there just because there's just nowhere you could go after that."

"As the security guard had told me, I knew we had to do something," Vollmert and Place said. "I can't just ignore it. I'm grateful for the alerts, you know, because it just yesterday proves that they work. So I would just say, pay attention to the alerts and read them. And if there's pictures, look at them and just keep your eyes open because these type of things happen quite often."

"It just breaks our heart because we have kids ourselves…nobody ever wants a kid to be harmed or to be hurt or to be mistreated," they said.

Camelback Moving President Chad Olsen said, "This is definitely the first time we've ever blocked somebody in where the entire city and county and state are firmly behind us and happy we did so." The company had recently begun training its employees in human-trafficking awareness.

"We are incredibly proud of our community heroes for their courage, quick thinking and teamwork," Olsen said. "Their actions exemplify what it means to look out for our community and to take its safety seriously. This is a powerful reminder that the Amber Alert system works. We also want to express our sincere gratitude that Kehlani was safely returned to her family."

Rogers was returned to her parents, scared, but uninjured, police said. Noriega was taken into custody without a struggle.

The child’s parents said that they had let Noriega, a transient, stay the night at their home because she had nowhere else to go when she took their daughter. Noriega told detectives that the girl had been her long-lost daughter before admitting that she took the girl and did not give a reason why. She is being held on a $250,000 bond and has been booked into jail on one count of custodial interference.

Prosecutors said during a hearing on February 23, "It does appear that the defendant admitted that a glass pipe was located on her person during the search. And she admitted to smoking methamphetamine the day before."