The FBI says a North Carolina man who was rescued from kidnappers on Wednesday might have been targeted because of his daughter’s work as a prosecutor in Wake County.
Frank Janssen was missing from his home in Wake Forest for five days before an FBI team found and rescued him in Atlanta.
Investigators say Janssen’s captors were communicating via cell phone with a man whom Janssen’s daughter, a prosecutor who focuses on drug and gang cases, put in prison for life.
The North Carolina Department of Public Safety says 49-year-old Kelvin Melton was convicted in 2012 on charges of being a habitual felon and assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill.
After Janssen was taken, his wife started getting text messages with threats of mutilating him. Authorities haven’t specified what the demands were.
Five people were arrested on federal kidnapping charges, which carry a maximum sentence of life without parole.