A young couple showed up in Kelley Stokes’ store in Oquossoc Tuesday and mentioned they were taking their car to a garage to have it repaired.

Stokes thought the interaction was strange, and the apparent age disparity between the girl and young man gave her a funny feeling, her husband, Charles Stokes, said Wednesday.

Then, on Wednesday morning, the couple showed up at Stokes’ insurance office looking to buy car insurance.

He’d never seen them before, but they fit the description of the couple his wife had spoken to the day before. Armed with their names, he and some others in the office did a little detective work on the Internet.

“I kind of put two and two together and Googled their name,” Stokes said.

Results quickly came back with news stories about a missing Pennsylvania teen and her boyfriend. There were warrants out for the boyfriend’s arrest.

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Stokes called the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department.

Reaghan A. Chase, 15, of Grand Valley, Pennsylvania, was reported missing on Sept. 29. Pennsylvania State Police had a warrant out for the arrest of her boyfriend, Kyle Bedow, 18, also of Grand Valley.

Because of Stokes’ call, Bedow is being held in Franklin County Jail on charges of interference with the custody of a child and concealment of the whereabouts of a child — both third-degree felonies.

Reached on his cellphone Wednesday afternoon, Charles Stokes said his wife met the couple when they came into the Oquossoc General Store, which the Stokeses own, on Tuesday after taking their car to a garage to have it repaired.

“My wife had never met them before. They said they had damaged their car but had now decided to live here,” Stokes said.

He said Chase seemed too young to be with Bedow. “Truly, she (Chase) looked like she was 16 or so. It just didn’t fit right with my wife,” Stokes said.

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Kelley Stokes told him about the couple Tuesday night and tried to look them up online but couldn’t find anything, he said.

Then on Wednesday morning, the couple showed up at his office, saying they wanted to buy car insurance. “He was going to get a new Maine license. They were looking for work,” Stokes recalled.

Even though he hadn’t seen the couple before, they fit his wife’s description, he said.

In a news release, Franklin County Sheriff Scott Nichols said dispatchers got a tip that the two had been seen in Oquossoc and that Bedow’s car was parked at a garage in town. After dispatchers made contact with the garage, they were told Bedow was driving a rental car, which Franklin County Deputy Sandy Burke then found traveling on Main Street in Rangeley, Nichols said.

Burke pulled the car over, arrested Bedow and took Chase into protective custody.

According to Nichols, the couple had been camping in different places over the last nine days and apparently had been living in the woods.

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Nichols credited “great communication and caring” among the Stokeses, county communications personnel and Burke for “ending this nine-day ordeal.”

The case is still under investigation and additional charges against Bedow might be pending, Nichols said. Because the crime includes interstate travel, the Maine State Police also have been called in to assist with the investigation, he said.

Staff writer Lauren Abbate contributed to this report.

Peter McGuire — 861-9239

pmcguire@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @PeteL_McGuire


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