2-Day Search Ends With Father’s Arrest, Rescue of Girl, 5, in Los Padres

Four Ventura County sheriff’s deputies returned a 5-year-old girl to her mother Thursday, two days after the girl’s distraught father took her and a rifle into the vast Los Padres National Forest from their home in Castaic, authorities said.

A distraught Daniel Beverly, 33, disappeared with his daughter, Danielle, from their trailer park home Tuesday night. Before leaving, Beverly bound his wife, Karen, with duct tape and grabbed his high-powered deer-hunting rifle with scope, investigators said.

Ventura County authorities were notified of the family drama after Karen Beverly told deputies her husband may have taken their daughter into Los Padres, where Daniel often spent weekends hunting.

More than 50 Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies searched for the pair for two days. Ventura County deputies spent four fruitless hours Wednesday morning searching a 200-square-mile swath in the Lockwood Valley-Frazier Mountain area of the national forest. They were unable to locate Beverly’s white truck.

“We were really worried about the little girl,” said Deputy Tim Hagel of the Ventura sheriff’s helicopter crew. “The father had a high-powered rifle, was suicidal and had a little child. I’ve been on enough cases to know that many don’t have happy endings.”

But that night, deputies got two crucial tips that reduced the search to just four square miles.

A sheriff’s dispatcher working at the Lockwood Valley station recognized the truck’s description and was able to pinpoint seeing it in the area of the Mutau Flats--a desolate high desert region filled with pinon pines and chaparral, bears and deer.

“We don’t see a whole lot of cars out here, and the truck had a unique tire cover on the back that looked like cowhide,” dispatcher Sandi Vanni said.

Later that night, a rancher who knew Beverly called deputies with a tip that the distraught father might be staying in a trailer on his property within Mutau Flats.

About 10 a.m. Thursday, Hagel and three other deputies landed their helicopter out of view half a mile from the trailer, hiked in with guns drawn and hit pay dirt.

Ahead were several abandoned cabins and a 24-foot trailer. Beverly’s truck was found concealed nearby in a barn, authorities said.

As the deputies slowly approached, Beverly left the makeshift living quarters without his rifle and surrendered, officials said.

Danielle, wearing an oversized California Angels T-shirt and sneakers with Power Rangers designs on them, ran 50 yards to the safety of helicopter pilot Dan Shea, deputies said.

Beverly and his daughter were flown to the Lockwood Sheriff’s Station.

During the ride, Danielle appeared unaware of the high-stakes drama and spoke excitedly about her first helicopter ride.

“She kept saying that her friends would never believe she got to fly in a helicopter,” Hagel said.

Danielle was reunited with her mother at Lockwood and flown to the Santa Clarita Sheriff’s Station in Los Angeles County, where a cheerful Danielle was seen playing in the hallway with an oversized rag doll.

“She just gave me a big hug,” Karen Beverly said of the reunion. Apparently the little girl had been told by her father that she and he “had been camping out.”

A handcuffed Beverly was flown separately to Santa Clarita and booked on a charge of false imprisonment. He was being held in lieu of $45,000 bail.

Correspondent Danica Kirka contributed to this report.