Mother faked daughter's kidnapping

PHILADELPHIA – A suburban mother who claimed she and her daughter had been abducted and stuffed in a car trunk is in custody in Florida after the pair were found at Disney World, where they had flown hours after the mother reporting their abduction, a prosecutor said Wednesday.

Bonnie Sweeten, 38, of Feasterville, will be charged with false reports and identity theft, both misdemeanors, Bucks County District Attorney Michelle Henry said.

"We're pleased to be able to announce that she's in custody and more importantly that her 9-year-old daughter is safe," Henry said.

Henry told reporters that Sweeten borrowed a co-worker's driver's license and presented it as her own when she bought an airline ticket and flew to Orlando, Fla., then checked into the Grand Floridian Hotel with her daughter, Julia Rakoczy. The two were taken into custody at the hotel Wednesday evening, Henry said.

They had minimal luggage and the hotel was paid through Friday, Henry said. Sweeten had withdrawn about $12,000 from several bank accounts over recent days but authorities were investigating whether that money had been stolen.

"We believe that there were some domestic concerns with her husband and some financial concerns as well," Henry said.

The child is to be picked up by her father, Sweeten's ex-husband, and Sweeten is to be extradited from Florida, Henry said.

In the frantic 911 calls, Sweeten, said two men had bumped her 2005 GMC Denali, carjacked her and stuffed her in the trunk of a dark Cadillac. She implied that her daughter was with her in the trunk, according to Philadelphia police Lt. Frank Vanore, who listened to tapes of the calls.

Sweeten, who is white, described her assailants as black but otherwise gave few details about their appearance, Vanore said.

"It was pretty generic," he said.

Police found inconsistencies with her story from the start, and noted that they could not find witnesses on the busy road in Upper Southampton Township who saw an abduction. The Denali was found early Wednesday on a downtown Philadelphia street, about 20 miles away, with a parking ticket issued shortly after the calls were made. Police knew the 911 calls were made in the same area.

Sweeten has two other daughters, a 15-year-old from her prior marriage and an 8-month-old with her current husband, a landscaper. Julia Rakoczy attended elementary school in Bensalem until she was withdrawn from classes May 1, said Susan Harder, an administrative assistant with the Bensalem Township School District.

Her ex-husband and the 9-year-old girl's father, Tony Rakoczy, described Sweeten on NBC's "Today" show as a good mother. He declined comment to the AP.

A man at Sweeten's home refused to comment Wednesday and asked reporters to leave.

Neighbors said the family had lived in their relatively new development for about two years.

Sweeten is listed as a director of a New Hope-based charity called The Carlitz Foundation, run by lawyer Debbie Carlitz. The charity's stated goal is raising money for autism research and for people in Burma. The Web site lists e-mail address for Sweeten and Carlitz, neither of whom returned e-mail messages Wednesday night. Carlitz, whose law license was suspended in 2008 for one year, also did not return a phone message.

"Bonnie was a very, very organized person," said Susan Cordeiro, secretary of the parent-teacher group at Belmont Hills Elementary School in Bensalem, which Julia had attended. "She was at every meeting, she was very involved. ... She's on top of her game all the time, even when she was pregnant."

News that Sweeten and her daughter were safe touched off both sympathy and condemnation for Sweeten on Facebook. One poster expressed gratitude that the two were safe, while another said police should "put her in jail and throw away the key."

One of the posters on the site was Kathee Lipinski, of Warminster. Lipinski said she didn't know Sweeten but was concerned when she heard about a possible abduction happening so close to her home.

"I feel very stupid for believing her story and offering my prayers when she so completely duped everyone, including her family," Lipinski said. "On the other hand, I am grateful it wasn't an abduction. ... I hope her family is able to pull together and heal."

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