Oak Harbor juvenile charged with kidnapping

Published 1:30 am Tuesday, May 5, 2026

An Oak Harbor teenager is formally accused of abducting a 15-year-old girl last month, according to court documents.

Prosecutors charged the 17-year-old boy on May 1 with one count of kidnapping in the second degree. If convicted of the charge, he would face between 52 and 65 weeks of confinement.

While kidnapping cases in general are unusual in Island County Superior Court, a case in which a juvenile was accused of the crime might be a first.

The alleged kidnapping occurred on or about April 8, but prosecutors weren’t in a rush to charge the boy since he was being held in juvenile detention on a 30-day sentence for a probation violation in another case.

Just before 1 a.m. on April 10, a 15-year-old girl called 911 and reported that she had been held at gunpoint and beaten by the defendant; she said she needed help, according to a report by a deputy with the Island County Sheriff’s Office.

Deputy and officers from the Oak Harbor Police Department responded to the address and found the girl in the defendant’s bedroom. He ran outside but returned shortly afterward.

The girl claimed that the boy and his friend were both armed with guns and held her captive at a trailer on the property the previous day, the report states. She claimed the friend pointed a gun at her head and both of them punched her at different times, the deputy wrote.

The girl said she was in the bedroom with the boy that night, and she used her phone to record him assaulting her, the deputy wrote. She claimed that the video showed the boy place a gun into his waistband, but the deputy wrote that it was not clear enough to identify a firearm.

Since 2023, the boy has been booked into juvenile jail 10 times, the report states.

The News-Times does not generally name minor defendants in non-homicide cases.