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Investigators and police found Amber Rose Nicklas on Wednesday living with a family in Phoenix. It remains unclear how the family obtained her and whether she knows she was kidnapped.
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A Phoenix family that says it adopted a girl kidnapped as a toddler seven years ago in Norwalk had changed her name and birth date and kept her out of school, L.A. County sheriff's detectives announced Thursday.
Family members tried to hide Amber Rose Nicklas, who turns 8 next month, in a bathroom when detectives arrived at the Phoenix home Wednesday night, authorities said. They had no documents to prove her adoption.
L.A. County sheriff's investigators and Phoenix police found Amber living with the family in a small house that doubles as a tarot card and palm-reading business on a busy thoroughfare on the city's north end. Police and neighbors said it is the only house on the street.
"I never noticed people in or out for at least six months, if not more," said Ray Bladine, an auto-shop manager three doors down.
Amber had likely lived with the Phoenix family since shortly after her abduction, said L.A. County Sheriff's Det. Jerry Saba, who investigated the case.
"That was her family in her mind," Saba said Thursday during a news conference in Norwalk, adding that nothing was known about Amber's biological parents, including their whereabouts.
Amber's ordeal began shortly after her birth in August 2002, when she was taken from her grandmother, who was raising her, and placed with a foster family in L.A. County, Saba said.
The foster family took her to a meeting sanctioned by the county child services department in September 2003 with her three aunts, all juveniles, at a Chuck E. Cheese's restaurant on Firestone Boulevard in Norwalk.
While the foster parents were distracted, two aunts grabbed Amber and lifted her over a gate to a waiting third aunt, who drove off with her, said Sheriff's Capt. Patrick Maxwell.
Two aunts were arrested at the time and charged with kidnapping, said Maxwell. A judge later sealed records of the case, but it appears they served time in juvenile camp, he said. The third aunt remained at large.
After Amber disappeared, her case slowly faded into the department's cold files. The case was finally reopened last November when Saba, a 20-year veteran of the department, received a tip that did not pan out. But it led to other tips and eventually to the house in north Phoenix, where Amber lived with two parents, an adult brother and a preschool age sister for most of the last seven years, Saba said.
He described the family as distraught but cooperative Wednesday and that Amber appeared well cared for and cheerful.
Amber's footprint matched the one on file in Los Angeles County, Saba said. She was flown back to Southern California, where she was provided shelter by the county's Department of Children and Family Services.
"But she was reassured by her family and by us," Saba said. "We told her that we were going to take her to see some people who care about her."
Still, Saba said: "It was heart-wrenching. I felt like I was victimizing her again."
It remained unclear how the Phoenix family obtained Amber or whether she was aware she had been kidnapped.
Saba has interviewed the third aunt, but he declined to comment on what she said or whether she will be charged.
Maxwell said Amber was victimized first by living in an unfit home, then by being kidnapped from her foster parents.
"Last night, law enforcement took her away from the only family she knows," he said. "We're happy we did locate the child. But we all should remember this child has been a victim three times."
sam.quinones@latimes.com
