A 1-year-old girl named Emiliana Gonzalez was inside a blue Dodge Charger when a man drove off with it from the 800 block of South Broadway in downtown St. Louis around 10:40 p.m. Sunday, prompting a statewide AMBER Alert. Police describe the child as wearing a gray onesie at the time she was last seen.
The theft happened just blocks from Busch Stadium and Broadway Oyster Bar, a stretch of the downtown commercial corridor, according to Hertz Investment Group. As reported by First Alert 4, the Missouri State Highway Patrol identified the suspect as 43-year-old Joseph Nickell, also known by the nickname JoJo, who was last seen wearing a nude or tan shirt, dark blue jeans and Nike shoes. Investigators describe Nickell as 6 feet tall with dark hair and a mustache.
Witnesses told the highway patrol that the stolen Charger was last seen heading eastbound on Walnut Street, the station’s report notes. The vehicle is described as a 2015-2023 blue Dodge Charger with two racing stripes on the hood, carrying Illinois plates and an Illinois temporary tag, per the same account.
How Missouri Decides When to Sound the Alarm
Missouri does not issue AMBER Alerts automatically whenever a car goes missing with a child aboard. State guidelines require law enforcement to have a reasonable belief that a child 17 or younger has been abducted, that the child faces a credible threat of serious injury or death, and that officials have enough descriptive detail about the victim, suspect or vehicle to make an alert useful, according to the Missouri State Highway Patrol. Before a statewide alert goes out, local departments must first hold a mandatory joint evaluation conference call with the patrol’s Troop F Headquarters in Jefferson City, the same agency explains…