Girl, 7, Rescued After 24-Hour Kidnap Ordeal : Port Hueneme: The child is found in Las Vegas with a man who police say had sexually assaulted her mother.

A 7-year-old girl who was kidnaped from Port Hueneme after allegedly being tied and gagged while her mother was sexually assaulted was rescued by police in Las Vegas Friday and the man suspected of abducting her was arrested.

Justo Dungca, 34, was arrested by Las Vegas police on suspicion of attempted murder, felony child endangerment and first-degree kidnaping with injuries. Port Hueneme police were investigating the alleged sexual assault.

Police were forced to physically subdue Dungca, who allegedly had grabbed the girl in a stranglehold when he spotted them and threatened to kill her if they came closer.

The arrest and rescue came almost 24 hours after the child and her mother allegedly were attacked by Dungca, held captive for hours in a Port Hueneme house where Dungca and the woman both rented rooms and taken on a nightmarish ride through Southern California.

“We’re all relieved,” said Chief Bob Anderson of the Port Hueneme Police Department. “We had been worried to death.”

Police said that shortly before noon Thursday the girl’s mother received a call at work from her daughter saying she was sick.

The 27-year-old woman said she returned to the house where she rents a room in the 600 block of Bard Road and saw her daughter sitting on a couch and crying.

Dungca, who rents a room in the house, was waiting for the woman, Anderson said. As the mother approached her daughter, Dungca grabbed the woman and took the two of them into his bedroom, where he bound and gagged them, Anderson said.

The daughter was forced to remain in the room while Dungca sexually assaulted and beat the mother, Anderson said. Police said they were unsure whether she was raped.

Sometime later that afternoon Dungca forced the woman and her daughter into the woman’s car and began driving to Anaheim because Dungca said he wanted to visit an ex-girlfriend there, Anderson said.

When they arrived in Anaheim about 9 p.m., the woman asked the suspect to pull over to a gas station “on the pretext that she had to use the restroom,” Anaheim Police Sgt. Chet Barry said.

“She went into the restroom and came back to the car and tried to grab her daughter out of the vehicle, but the suspect drove away with the daughter before she got her out,” Barry said. The child was in the back seat of the car, he said.

After the suspect fled, the woman called police from a pay phone. Anaheim police responded to the call and found the woman, who had a “pretty good black eye” from the suspect, Barry said.

The woman told police that the suspect intended to rape her. The suspect “verbally indicated that he was thinking in that direction,” Barry said.

The Anaheim Police Department notified Port Hueneme police, who broadcast a description of the stolen car, suspect and girl, Anderson said.

But nothing was heard about Dungca or the child until 11 a.m. Friday, when Dungca, who had no money, allegedly appeared at a Las Vegas car dealership trying to sell or trade the woman’s car.

A car dealer at Gaudin Ford called Las Vegas police and said the man was trying to sell a stolen vehicle, said Lt. Greg Jolley of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.

When police officers arrived, they saw Dungca sitting in the dealership holding the little girl on his lap, Jolley said.

“As the officers approached, he said, ‘I’m going to kill the girl,’ ” Jolley said. “They continued to approach and the suspect put his arm around the girl’s neck and appeared to be choking her.”

Two of the officers tried to subdue the suspect and wrest the child away from him. But in an ensuing scuffle, all four people fell to the ground, Jolley said.

“Before officers could take the child away, the suspect grabbed her by the back of the head by her hair and repeatedly banged her head on the floor,” Jolley said.

The little girl was taken to University Medical Center, where she was treated for bumps on the head, Jolley said.

Anderson said he did not know whether the child was sexually abused.

The child’s parents flew to Las Vegas with detectives on Friday afternoon to retrieve their daughter.

Anderson said the department plans to book Dungca on several counts, including assault, sexual assault, false imprisonment and kidnaping. He said police had found no link between Dungca and the woman except that they were tenants in the same house.

Police said that they were unaware of any weapons used in the kidnaping and that they had found no prior arrest record for Dungca. They described him as an unemployed man living in Port Hueneme for an unknown amount of time.

Neighbors along the quiet, residential street near Parkview School said they had heard no altercations and were surprised by what had happened.

They said the people living in the residence were quiet but friendly, waving at neighbors and occasionally inviting them over for barbecues.

Times staff writer Matt Lait contributed to this story.