Missing Newport woman calls home from Illinois

NEWPORT – At 3 a.m. Saturday, Sharel Nelson snatched the ringing phone from the hook, praying as she had for 11 days that her daughter was on the other end of the line.

“It was beyond belief,” Nelson said Monday, as she recalled finally hearing her daughter’s voice on the phone.

Tomasina Lederman, 18, of Newport boarded a bus in Bangor nearly two weeks ago bound for her grandparents’ home in Denver and never arrived.

“All she said was ‘I’m OK, Mom,’ and when I asked her where she was, she began to cry and said, ‘I don’t know,'” Nelson recalled. Then the phone line went dead.

By Monday, Lederman had been located by Schiller Park police, just outside of Chicago. She had told them she had been abducted off the westbound bus, according to Newport Police Chief James Ricker.

“She is unharmed, unhurt, alive and well,” Ricker said Monday morning.

Schiller Park is one mile outside of Chicago, near O’Hare Airport, said Schiller Park police Officer James Cook, who confirmed Monday that Lederman appeared fine and refused medical treatment.

As to what happened to the Newport woman over the past two weeks, just about everyone is keeping quiet.

“We know she got off the bus in Chicago to smoke a cigarette,” Cook said. “The events after that remain under investigation.” He would not confirm whether the investigation included possible kidnapping charges. Ricker could not provide further details.

After talking to her daughter early Monday, Nelson said, “All she keeps saying is she wants to come home.

“She has gone through a lot, that much is clear,” Nelson said. “And she is scared of whoever it was [that abducted her].”

Nelson said she did not pressure her daughter for information because Lederman cried throughout the conversation and she sounded disoriented.

“We’ll be getting her some professional help,” Nelson said. “I’m sure there are some things she will have to work through.”

Nelson said Lederman was expected late Monday at Bangor International Airport.

Meanwhile, Nelson wanted to thank all those who provided the Nelson family with support over the past two weeks. “My employer, Wal-Mart, has bent over backwards,” she said. “They made up more than 500 fliers that we passed out at truck stops in Newport and at Dysart’s.”

The mother continued: “Perfect strangers came up to me and said we are praying for you and Tomasina. There are so many people to thank. They will never know what their support meant to us.”