FLAGLER COUNTY, FL – An 18-year-old Palm Coast man has been arrested following a multi-state investigation that led deputies to Houston, Texas, where a missing 15-year-old girl was located and safely recovered.
According to the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office, deputies responded to a home on Beckner Lane on January 11 after receiving a report of a missing juvenile. The girl’s father told deputies he believed his daughter was with Brandon Lee Gray II, 18, and said Gray had previously taken the girl out of state without permission in December 2025. During that earlier incident, the juvenile was located with Gray in Valdosta, Georgia, and Gray was explicitly told the girl was 15 years old and that he was not permitted to have contact with her. That incident was not reported to law enforcement at the time.
Detectives later determined Gray had purchased two bus tickets to Houston using fictitious names and his mother’s bank account. With assistance from the Houston Police Department, the juvenile was located at a bus station in Houston on January 11. She was placed into protective custody by HPD’s Missing Persons Unit and returned to Florida…