Two Lynchburg women jailed, charged with child abduction

Updated 6p.m. story script
At first, Louise Pugliese seemed like any other distraught mother who calls police. After all, everyone thought her children had run away from their foster home.

“We were contacted by the biological mother of those three juveniles, as well as a family friend who lived together in reference to the children having disappeared, where they might be, what we were doing to help, how they could help.“, says Lynchburg Police Captain Brandon Zuidema.

Zuidema tells us Pugliese and her live-in friend Ariel Odom already knew the answer to the question of where.

“Ms. Pugliese and Ms. Odum were actually responsible for meeting the children the morning they left the foster home.“, says Zuidema.

From there, police say the women kept the children at a motel along the Lynchburg Expressway for several days before renting a moving truck from a Timberlake Road store.  Police believe the children were hauled like furniture in the back of the truck.

Four days later, the children were found safe nearly 400 miles from Lynchburg in Pen Argyl, Pennsylvania.

When the children were found with a family friend in Pennsylvania on Sunday, police there were told that the kids hitch hiked all the way there from Lynchburg.

Pugliese and Odom had told police to look in Pennsylvania but police say the duo tried to throw them somewhat off the trail.

“They never came out and said, we think so and so did it but there were things that you could have assumed were pointing us in a direction.“, says Zuidema.

Now everyone is back in Lynchburg.  The children are in protective custody.  The mom and her friend are just in custody.

Police tell us they have talked briefly to the biological father of the children.  He lives in Pennsylvania.  They say he had no knowledge of the plan and might be attempting to get custody of the children.
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What appeared at first to be a runaway situation has landed two Lynchburg women in jail on child abduction charges, Lynchburg Police said Wednesday.

Louise Pugliese, 47, and Ariel Odom, 20, were each charged with three counts of felony child abduction and are also facing other pending charges, police said in a news release.

Three children were reported missing from a Lynchburg foster home on June 10, police said.

Pugliese, the children’s biological mother, and Odom, a family friend, both contacted Lynchburg police about the situation.

Detectives from the Lynchburg Police Department investigated the case, along with Lynchburg Child Protective Services, the Pen Argyl, Penn., Police Department and Child Protective Services in Pennsylvania.

The children were located on Sunday in the Pen Argyl area, and police said at the time that it appeared the children had run away, having hitchhiked from Virginia.

Lynchburg Police said Wednesday that Pugliese and Odom had picked the children up from the foster home themselves, and kept them in a Lynchburg motel for several days.

They then rented a truck, and drove the children to Pennsylvania, police said.

Police said all three children are back in Lynchburg, and in the custody of Child Protective Services.

The additional charges against Pugliese and Odom stem from this case and two related crimes they reported, police said.