A man who held a ride share driver at gunpoint last year and forced the victim to drive over 1,300 miles from Texas to South Florida in an attempt to kidnap a social media influencer was sentenced on Thursday to 12 years in prison, prosecutors said.
The man, Miguel Alejandro Pastran Hernandez, 24, pleaded guilty in December to charges of kidnapping, carjacking and carrying a firearm to commit a violent crime, according to a news release from the U.S. attorney’s office in the Southern District of Florida.
According to federal prosecutors, Mr. Pastran Hernandez ordered a ride around 10:30 p.m. on Aug. 16 near Arlington, Texas. After the driver took Mr. Pastran Hernandez to the destination indicated on the app, the driver, referred to in court records only as Victim 1, heard a gun being loaded and saw that Mr. Pastran Hernandez was holding what appeared to be a firearm.
At first, Mr. Pastran Hernandez threatened to tie up the driver and put him in the back of the car, but the driver begged to drive the vehicle, according to an affidavit prepared by an F.B.I. agent.
Mr. Pastran Hernandez agreed, and he demanded that the driver take him to Florida and also told the driver he had other guns in his luggage, prosecutors said. Along the way, they said, Mr. Pastran Hernandez discovered a blue handgun in the vehicle that belonged to the driver. Mr. Pastran Hernandez loaded it and used it to threaten the driver during the journey.
As they passed through Louisiana, Mr. Pastran Hernandez told the driver to call his children and tell them he was on a long work trip so they would not get suspicious.
On the night of Aug. 17, the two arrived in Miami Beach, which is about 1,300 miles from Arlington, Texas. The next day, prosecutors said, Mr. Pastran Hernandez told the driver to take him to a home where he said a social media influencer lived and that he had intended to kidnap the influencer or a family member of the influencer for a $3 million ransom.
On Aug. 19, according to prosecutors, Mr. Pastran Hernandez told the driver to take him to a Dollar General in Hialeah, Fla., where he was going to buy supplies for the kidnapping. Soon after, the police arrived and Mr. Pastran Hernandez ran from the store. He was found hours later in a park, still in possession of the blue handgun he had taken from the driver, and was taken into custody, the authorities said.
Investigators also found multiple BB guns, knives, a black mask, hat, sunglasses, binoculars, walkie-talkies and zip-ties in Mr. Pastran Hernandez’s backpack.
A lawyer representing Mr. Pastran Hernandez did not immediately return a request for comment on Thursday.
