Dramatic footage reveals moment sisters, aged four and 11 months, rescued from trailer after Atlanta kidnapping

Bodycam footage has revealed the moment two sisters, aged four and 11 months, were rescued from inside a sweltering-hot tow trailer Monday afternoon after allegedly being kidnapped by their babysitter. The footage, released Tuesday by the Atlanta Police Department, shows an officer using a concrete block and pliers to force their way into a trailer where the two children were hidden under a blanket, and yelling “Put your hands up!” at a woman also inside. Officers then lifted the two crying sisters, who had been missing for nearly two days, from the trailer that was parked at an apartment complex in southwest Atlanta.

He was then heard reassuring the 4-year-old: “You’re alright.” The trailer, which appeared to be lined with chipboard and cluttered with clothes and a baby carrier, was “unclean and unsuitable” for children and had no air conditioning despite temperatures reaching 97 degrees, investigators said. The rescue ended a desperate search that began Saturday evening after the girls’ mother, Elicia Redding, said she left her daughters, Zola Cooper, 4, and 11-month-old Norah Cooper, for the day in the care of Brown. She had first met the woman a year earlier through a Facebook group for expectant mothers.

"I first met her when she made a post about doing hair for expecting moms. She reached out," Redding told CBS News. "The first time she reached out, I brushed it to the side, and the second time I just let her do my hair, and after that we started talking and being friends." Brown allegedly offered to take the girls to Walmart and Candy Utopia, according to an arrest warrant reviewed by WRDW.

Redding said she repeatedly contacted Brown throughout the day and was told that everything was fine. The two women agreed to meet at the children’s grandmother’s home, but Brown never arrived. I trusted her, and she broke that trust,” Redding told WSB-TV.

Investigators initially responded to what they believed was a custody dispute but determined that a kidnapping had occurred and launched a search for the woman and the children. Police eventually tracked Brown to a property on Sylvan Road using her cellphone location, according to the warrant. The location was about five miles from where police said the girls were last seen at a residential property.

Officers who surrounded the trailer could hear the children crying inside before they burst in. The sisters were taken to Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta for evaluation before being reunited with their family. The girls were in good health, police said.