A woman who had allegedly been kidnapped by her husband was rescued after she secretly passed a note asking for help to a Domino’s Pizza employee. According to USA Today , the 32-year-old woman was found bound and gagged at a home in Chamberino, New Mexico after police were tipped off by the pizza employee.
The woman walked into a Domino’s Pizza in Anthony, Texas to pick up a pizza, according to Police Chief Carlos Enriquez.
The couple went “to get something to eat,” the officer said.
“He allowed her to go inside to pick up the pizza and she was able to pass the information to the clerk.”
The woman indicated in the note that she was being abused and held against her will by her husband in their home, about eight miles away in Chamberino, New Mexico.
An across-state investigation was opened at about midnight on Monday, and police arrived at the home at 1 a.m. on Tuesday to find the beaten woman inside a room, according to the El Paso Times .
The police had no details on how long the woman had been held, but she was reportedly crying and thankful that she had been found.
Police arrested Roberto Dominguez for domestic violence. He will also face kidnapping charges in El Paso County.
“The officers didn’t take it (the note) as a joke and investigated it fully and because of their due diligence were able to rescue the woman and get her out of harm’s way,” Enriquez said.
It’s not the first instance of secret communication resulting in the rescue of an at-risk individual. In 2017, an eagle-eyed flight attendant left a note for a teen girl that she suspected was the victim of human trafficking. According to the New York Daily News , Shelia Fedrick noticed an unkempt young girl who boarded a plane in Seattle with a well-dressed older man.
How Shelia Fedrick, a flight attendant with Alaska Airlines, saved a young girl from human trafficking. https://t.co/K0ZsdBPAc6 pic.twitter.com/XQiTqcV6Wm
— Gabe Ortíz (@TUSK81) February 4, 2017
“[The girl] looked like she had been through pure hell,” Fedrick said.
So she left a note for the girl in the plane’s bathroom.
“I left a note in one of the bathrooms,” Fedrick said. “She wrote back on the note and said, ‘I need help.’”
In 2018, a woman slipped a note to the staff at a Florida veterinary hospital asking for help, according to CNN .
“Call the cops. My boyfriend is threatening me. He has a gun. Please don’t let him know,” the note read.
The staff called the police and the man was arrested.
