The father of a 3-year-old girl found alone near a suburban Chicago forest preserve was ordered held in lieu of $300,000 bail on a felony arrest warrant for aggravated kidnapping.
Faiz Ikramullah is expected back in court in Skokie on May 5 for a preliminary hearing. Ikramullah, 35, was charged last week and jailed in Van Buren County, Michigan before he was returned to Illinois.
An initial investigation with the Department of Children and Family Services found the girl’s father put her in a trash can and drove away, authorities said. She was found crying April 7 as she wandered alone along Milwaukee Avenue on the edge of the Allison Woods Forest Preserve in Prospect Heights.
The Cook County Sheriff’s Office said the girl was identified after investigators learned her mother was in the process of filing missing person reports.
The child knew her name and was able to tell Cook County sheriff’s investigators she’d been left in the forest preserve, Cara Smith, a sheriff’s office spokeswoman, said last week.
“She was far away from any place she was familiar with,” Smith told reporters at that time.
The Illinois Department of Children and Family Services had no prior contact with the family, spokeswoman Veronica Resa had said last week.
Three passersby spotted the girl walking along Milwaukee Avenue. The passersby stayed with the girl until forest preserve police arrived, Smith said. Other than being upset, the girl appeared unharmed.
“She knew her first name, but not her last,” Smith said last week. “Nor did she know her parents’ names.”
