Father Who Fled With Daughters in ’79 Is Indicted
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CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — A father who disappeared with his two daughters nearly 20 years ago was indicted Tuesday by a grand jury for kidnapping.
Stephen Fagan fled to Florida with the children, then 2 and 5, in 1979. He told them their mother was dead, adopted the identity Dr. William Martin and built a new life that would include expensive cars and membership to some of the most exclusive clubs in Palm Beach, Fla.
Fagan, 56, who was arrested in April, is scheduled to be arraigned June 25 on two counts of kidnapping and one of contempt for violating a probate court order prohibiting him from taking the children, according to the Middlesex County district attorney’s office.
Fagan maintains he took the girls to protect them from an alcoholic mother.
His daughters, Lisa and Rachael Martin, have supported their father and have not reunited with their mother.
Barbara Kurth, who remarried and works as a cellular biologist in Virginia, has denied she was an unfit mother.
Fagan, formerly of Framingham, is free on $250,000 bail.
If convicted, he could be sentenced to 10 years in prison for each kidnapping charge.
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