Kidnapped Daughter Found After 30 Years

A woman whose father was charged with kidnapping her as a child 30 years ago has been found living in Arizona, her mother and sheriff’s officials said.

On Mother’s Day weekend in 1976, Laura Gooder’s estranged husband, Eric Douglas Nielsen, picked up 21-month-old Genevieve Rachel Nielsen for an overnight visit. They never returned.

This Mother’s Day weekend, a police officer arrived at Gooder’s home in Frederic, Mich., with news that her daughter -- now 31 -- had been found, the Detroit News reported.

Gooder’s daughter had been raised under another name and grew up believing her mother had been killed in an auto accident. Law enforcement officials declined to release her other name.

“It is pretty surreal,” Gooder, 53, said. “I am keeping my fingers crossed and waiting for her to call.”

Eric Nielsen has been serving time in Arizona, under a different identity and for an unrelated crime, authorities said. A tip led investigators to visit the prison Thursday, said Sheriff Michael J. Bouchard of Oakland County, Mich.

Gooder’s daughter is traumatized by the revelations, Bouchard said.

“She obviously was told something completely different from the father,” Bouchard said. “She is devastated.”

U.S. marshals joined the search for Gooder’s daughter last year.