A two-year search for a missing Oregon mother and her three children ended this week at a Discount Tire shop in Raleigh, where U.S. Marshals arrested 41-year-old Jennifer Lynn Blackthorne on a fugitive kidnapping charge. Three children, ages 4, 8, and 10, were found safe at a home on West Chestnut Street in Wake Forest and turned over to North Carolina child protective services.
Blackthorne, who has an address in Roseburg, Oregon, was wanted on a kidnapping charge out of Douglas County, Oregon, according to CBS 17. U.S. Marshals received a tip from Oregon on September 7 that she might be in the Raleigh area, and she was arrested days later at the tire shop in the 11000 block of Capital Boulevard. Per a magistrate order cited by the station, investigators had tracked her movement from the West Coast through Pennsylvania, then Florida, before she surfaced in North Carolina.
The three children recovered in Wake Forest include the child linked to the kidnapping charge, and the station reports they were found in good condition. A public missing-child notice from the Facebook page Fighting had circulated earlier, identifying aliases Blackthorne allegedly used while evading authorities, including Jennifer Owens, Fiona Blackthorne, Lynn Owens, and Jennifer Blackthorne, and tying the case to National Center for Missing & Exploited Children case number 2034831.
How She Allegedly Slipped Across State Lines
Earlier search notices from the Missing Persons Advocacy Center indicated investigators suspected Blackthorne had been traveling in a 1991 Toyota Winnebago Warrior motorhome bearing an Oregon license plate, and had allegedly disguised her three children as females during the flight, according to a February post from the group’s Facebook page. Those notices placed her path moving from the West Coast through Pennsylvania and Florida before her eventual apprehension in North Carolina.
What Blackthorne Faces Under Oregon Law
Oregon law treats interstate removal of a child during a custody dispute under specialized felony statutes. Under Oregon Revised Statutes 163.257, taking a child out of state in violation of legal custody constitutes First-Degree Custodial Interference, a Class C felony carrying up to five years in prison, according to the Oregon State Legislature. Second-degree kidnapping under ORS 163.225 carries Class B felony penalties of up to 10 years…