Lilburn PD says man tried to lure 10-year-old into car

GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — Lilburn police released a sketch of a man they say tried to lure a 10-year-old girl into his car.

Investigators say on June 1, about 8 p.m., an African-American man approached the child as she skated in a church parking lot with her mother nearby.

The man allegedly told the girl she was very pretty and could be a model.

"The mother saw the vehicle pull up, so she immediately started walking to the vehicle. The driver, we were told, asked the girl if she wanted to race him," Lilburn Police Capt. Thomas Bardugon said.

He added the girl's mother got a look at the man detectives are now calling a person of interest then and at a gas station a couple of miles away.

"She pulled up next to the car, saw the driver, realized it was the same person. He saw her looking at him, and attempted to hide his face and then he drove out of the parking (area)," Bardugon said.

Cameras at the gas station captured the exchange.

Police provided Channel 2 Action News video of the man. In one clip, he is seen inside the gas station. In another, he is outside inside a dark-colored car at a gas pump.

Bardugon said detectives want to ask the man why he drove up to the girl in the church parking lot and what he would have done if she got in his car.

"That is what we are trying to do right now, is identify this person and find out what his motive was and what he was really up to," Bardugon said.

The mother of the child was able to give investigators a partial tag number of the car the man was seen in.

WSBTV