Columbia, SC (WLTX) - The FBI filed a formal complaint in federal court that outlines the events leading up to the kidnapping, and then arrest, of 37-year-old Thomas Lawton Evans Jr.
According to the complaint, on Tuesday, February 13, the mother of 4-year-old Heidi Renae Todd, was dropping off two of her other children at school. When she returned to home around 8:30 a.m., the report says she was entering her home with her three other children, when "she was attacked from behind by a man with a knife."
The report goes on to say that she was pushed into her home, tackled to the ground and physically assaulted, "leaving her with facial fractures and brain bleeding among other significant injuries."
Police were later called when she did not return to pick up her two children who were in school, and at 5:30 p.m. a welfare check by the Charleston Police Department revealed signs of an assault. Officers say "she had markings as if she had been tied up."
That's also when they noticed that her 4-year-old daughter was missing.
The FBI filed a formal criminal complaint against Thomas Lawton Evans Jr, the man accused of kidnapping 4-year-old Heidi Renae Todd of Charleston. @WLTX pic.twitter.com/UM5yAPeIE9
The report says the next day around 7:30 in the morning, an electronic access device belonging to the child's mother was used at a gas station in Greensboro, Georgia.
Agents say surveillance video showed "a white male trying to use the device." That person was later seen driving away in a car.
Later in the day, the report says that the Riverdale, Alabama Police Chief Rick Oliver got a call about a suspicious car parked near railroad tracks. The chief approached the car, saw a little girl in the car wearing adult sized clothing, spoke to the driver, and asked for identification. He later discovered that the driver was Evans.
That is when the chief was able to get the 4-year-old from the car, before Evans got back in the car and drove away.
Evans was arrested a few hours later in Lauderdale County, Mississippi.
The report says that he was not related nor does he have any legal custody of 4-year-old Heidi Renae Todd.