CNN.com
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Sen. Bob Corker says his daughter is fine but “really sore” after being pulled from her car and thrown to the ground in a carjacking in the nation’s capital.
The Tennessee Republican said his 22-year-old daughter, Julia, stopped the family’s 2005 Chevrolet Tahoe not far from their apartment -- just nine blocks from the U.S. Capitol building -- to help someone she thought needed directions Wednesday night.
“A gentleman appeared, opened the door, grabbed her by the neck,” the senator told CNN on Thursday. “She kicked to try to get away ... and he threw her on the pavement and drove away.”
A short time later, two suspects were taken into custody in a parking lot in Seat Pleasant, Maryland. Corker credited the vehicle’s OnStar service with helping to find it.
OnStar is a navigation and tracking system that General Motors installs in its new vehicles.
“It’s pretty incredible how quickly they were able to apprehend” the suspects, the senator said.
The two people in the car were taken into custody by police in Seat Pleasant after OnStar determined their exact location -- at a Taco Bell about seven miles from where the carjacking took place -- and showed that the vehicle was not moving, Corker said.
OnStar notified Seat Pleasant authorities that the stolen car was in their jurisdiction, and police were given the vehicle’s description and tag number, Seat Pleasant Police Sgt. Leroy Patterson told CNN.
“The officers just searched, and they saw a vehicle matching that description,” Patterson said, adding that the two suspects were taken to a Maryland station to be interviewed by Metropolitan Police detectives. The Metropolitan department “will handle the actual charges, because the incident happened in Washington, D.C.,” Patterson said.
Corker praised the work of the Metropolitan Police, U.S. Capitol Police, the FBI and Seat Pleasant Police.
He also admitted that he often thought about canceling the OnStar service subscription, which costs about $18 per month.
“I was telling the lady who handles that for me in Chattanooga, each month I was saying, ‘I don’t want to pay this, I don’t want to pay this,’ ” Corker said, adding that it was a nominal fee.
But he kept the service, “thinking that maybe OnStar would be of some help” someday, Corker said. “Certainly it paid off tremendously last night,” he said Thursday.
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