Another Thwarted Abduction in Irvine

Police are looking for the man who purportedly tried to abduct a 12-year-old on her way home from school Tuesday, marking the third such incident in recent weeks in Irvine.

A masked man holding a puppy on a yellow leash jumped out of a tan Honda sedan on Deer Spring and grabbed the girl’s wrist, said Lt. Mike Hamel, an Irvine police spokesman.

The girl hit the man’s hand and fled, police said, and reported the incident Thursday night.

The man was described as 5-foot-9, about 170 pounds with a dark complexion.

He was wearing a black ski mask, a black long-sleeved T-shirt with the brand name “Hurley” on the front, black dress pants and brown boots, police said.

Over a two-hour period on May 18, three 15-year-old girls were confronted in two incidents by men who tried to coax them into cars, police said.

About 4:30 p.m. that day, a man driving a black sedan pulled alongside one of the girls near Charnock Drive and Yale Avenue, jumped out of his vehicle and tried to force her into the car. She broke free and ran home, police said. An hour later, two men in a blue compact car pulled up alongside two 15-year-old girls near San Marino and Alton Parkway and tried to talk to them. When the girls ignored them, one man got out of the car and grabbed their wrists, police said, but drove off after one of the girls shoved a notebook in his chest and ran.

None of the girls was injured, police said.

Hamel said it was unclear whether the attacks were connected.