Teen girl found safe following police shootout in multi-state search for abduction suspect

LONOKE, Ark. (TCD) --

A Pennsylvania man died after a shootout with police in Arkansas on Saturday after allegedly kidnapping a 14-year-old girl from her home in North Carolina a week earlier.

Davidson County Sheriff’s deputies received a report of a missing 14-year-old girl on Feb. 11. Deputies said the teen had been using her school-issued computer to communicate with a man on “multiple online platforms.”

The man was identified as Pennsylvania resident William Ice, 38. Investigators determined Ice had been talking to “several other juvenile females in Alamance County,” N.C. Deputies interviewed the girls, who provided information about the suspect.

Deputies said Ice had taken the missing 14-year-old girl from her residence on Feb. 11, and was driving a red Dodge Durango SUV. Warrants were issued for first-degree kidnapping and soliciting a child by computer.

Multiple state and federal law enforcement agencies joined the search, and investigators discovered the suspect was seen in the area of Lonoke County, Ark.

Arkansas State Police said two Lonoke Police officers “recognized a Dodge sport utility vehicle parked at the McDonald’s restaurant near Interstate 40” at 8 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 20.

The officers approached the suspect vehicle and ordered the driver to get out, whereupon the suspect exited, aimed a gun at one of the officers and began shooting, critically wounding the officer, police said.

The second officer returned fire as the suspect got back into his vehicle drove away. An Arkansas State Police trooper saw the vehicle leaving the McDonald’s parking lot and gave chase. The suspect vehicle soon “became disabled in a snowbank.” The missing 14-year-old girl ran from the vehicle, and she was taken to safety by a trooper.

William Ice was found in the vehicle with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Ice was airlifted to a Little Rock hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

The officer struck by gunfire was listed in stable condition and was expected to make a full recovery, Lonoke Police said.

The 14-year-old girl was returned to her family in Denton, N.C.

Arkansas State Police said Ice was wanted in Pennsylvania in connection with other child-predator cases.

WRAL-TV reports Ice was also talking with as many as 10 juveniles online, including two 13-year-olds in Alamance County, N.C. “Ice was sophisticated in his use of social media, first passing himself off as a teen in his online conversations before later showing himself as an adult, authorities said. He also used an alias, they said,” according to WRAL.

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