A man was charged Friday with abducting a 7-year-old girl who had just gotten off her school bus in Zimmerman, Minn., on Wednesday and sexually assaulting her at a hotel in Plymouth.

Joseph Andrew Bragg, 28, of International Falls, Minn., is charged in Sherburne County District Court with kidnapping and first-degree criminal sexual assault of a child.

Joseph Andrew Bragg (Courtesy of the Sherburne County Sheriff’s Office)

The girl’s disappearance led to a large search of the area in near-zero-degree weather, and an Amber Alert after investigators realized she was likely abducted by a stranger.

Bragg and the girl were located early Thursday in Albert Lea, Minn., more than 130 miles south of where she was abducted. The girl was taken to a hospital to be evaluated.

Authorities announced Bragg’s arrest at a Thursday morning news conference.

“This is every family’s worst nightmare to lose your child, whether they wander off in the terribly cold temperatures that we have in Minnesota, or in a case like this, that they were taken by somebody,” said Drew Evans, superintendent of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.

Bragg remained jailed Friday in lieu of $4 million bail. An attorney for Bragg is not listed in his court case file.

Charges: He contacted mother through Facebook

According to the criminal complaint:

Deputies were notified the girl was missing about 6:30 p.m. Wednesday. Family members said she had gone to school and was usually dropped off by the bus at 3:40 p.m. but had not returned home.

Camera footage from a neighbor showed the girl walking toward her home at 3:53 p.m. then turning and walking back toward her bus stop out of view. No vehicles or people were seen in the footage. Deputies canvassed the neighborhood in search of the girl.

The girl’s mother told law enforcement that she had an unusual online interaction last month involving someone with a Facebook profile username of “Joseph Bragg.” She said he added her as a friend on Facebook early last month and that she added him back as she thought she recognized him as a relative of an associate.

Bragg asked the mother questions about herself, including whether she had children, and “indicated he wanted children of his own, was not discouraged to learn a woman already had children, and indicated a desire to engage in activities with children,” the complaint says. He said he works in child care and asked the mother if she knew anyone in the Zimmerman/Princeton area looking for such services.

The mother ultimately blocked Bragg on Facebook.

The girl’s mother and father told law enforcement they are not otherwise familiar with a “Joseph Bragg,” prompting authorities to identify him as a suspect in the girl’s disappearance.

Law enforcement learned through its investigation that Bragg had access to a rented white 2025 Dodge Ram pickup truck. Location data of his cellphone showed he was traveling south toward the Iowa border, prompting the Amber Alert just before midnight.

At about 12:30 a.m. Thursday, a sergeant with the Albert Lea Police Department saw a white pickup truck matching the suspect’s vehicle at a gas pump in Albert Lea, about 12 miles from the border.

The officer followed the truck as it turned onto County Road 46 and confirmed its license plate number was that of the suspect’s vehicle. He saw the rear passenger taillight was not illuminating and made a traffic stop.

Bragg was driving and the girl was in the backseat, near or on top of a suitcase. No one else was in the truck. Bragg, who said he was on his way out of state, was arrested. He declined to give a statement to law enforcement.

He hired a Lyft driver

Investigators learned Bragg had a Lyft driver take him and the girl from a home residence in the Hamel/Corcoran area to a hotel in Plymouth. The Lyft driver reported driving a man and young female to the Ramada Inn. Hotel staff confirmed the defendant stayed in a room at the hotel.

The room was reserved for the time period between Dec. 27 and Wednesday. Hotel surveillance footage showed Bragg enter the hotel alone but carrying a large red suitcase that appeared to be difficult for him to handle. After about a half hour, Bragg left the hotel with the suitcase.

A search warrant was executed for the hotel room and law enforcement located a number of items, including unused diapers.

Law enforcement located Bragg’s car at home in Hamel. A resident there said Bragg asked to store his vehicle there because he would be traveling out of state.

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Location data confirmed the rented Dodge Ram was in the area of the girl’s home on Wednesday about the time she got off the bus, the complaint says. The truck was also in the same area at the same approximate time the previous day.

The girl was forensically interviewed and examined and reported being in a room with Bragg with her clothes off and described how she was sexually assaulted, the complaint says.

Evans: Talk to your children

Evans, of the BCA, commended the efforts of 200 members of law enforcement and 700 volunteers of the community who “scrambled together” after the girl’s disappearance.

In this case, he said, “there was a lot going on trying to determine if this child was missing, which happens every day across our state, or abducted. And as you can see, this team honed in on this and this frankly evil individual that took this child in this situation.”

Evans said the case highlights the importance of parents talking to their children about strangers who might approach them and ask to go with them.

“It’s a good reminder at this point in time,” he said. “Luckily, we have a child that’s alive today. … But we want to also make sure we’re reinforcing that with our children — unless the parent specifically is the one telling them to go with that person, that they do not get in a vehicle with that person.”

The Minnesota men’s and women’s hockey teams were both in action Friday night, with the women winning large and the men remaining winless on the new year.

Women: Minnesota 8, St. Cloud 1

The No. 3 Gophers women ran their winning streak to nine games with an 8-1 win at No. 15 St. Cloud State with Jamie Nelson netting herself a hat trick.

Nelson’s first goal of the game gave the visitors a 1-0 lead at the end of the first period before Minnesota exploded for seven scores in the middle frame. Josefin Bouveng, Abbey Murphy, Kendra Distad, Anabella Fanale and Ava Lindsay each scored once, with Nelson tallying two more.

The Gophers called off the dogs in the final period, with the hosts recording the lone score of the stanza to avoid being shutout at home.

Minnesota goaltender Hannah Clark made 24 saves to secure the lopsided victory.

The Gophers improved to 21-4 overall and 15-4 in WCHA play, while the Huskies fell to 8-15-2 overall and 4-13-2 within the circuit. The two teams play again at 2 p.m. Saturday, with the venue shifting to Ridder Arena. The game will be televised on Fox 9+.

Men: Michigan State 3, Minnesota 1

The Gophers men saw their winless streak hit five games with a 3-1 loss to No. 2 Michigan State in East Lansing, Mich.

LJ Mooney‘s power-play goal at 13:50 of the third period was all that stood between Minnesota and being shut out on the road after the Spartans recorded one goal in each period to skate off with the victory.

Minnesota goaltender Luca Di Pasquo was valiant on enemy ice, making 40 saves to keep the hosts from turning the game into a blowout.

The Gophers fell to 8-15-1 overall, 4-9 in Big Ten play, with the loss. Michigan State improved to 18-5 overall, 9-4 in the conference. The two teams play again at 5 p.m. Saturday evening in a game televised on the Big Ten Network.

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By TODD RICHMOND

Members of a motorcycle club and a street gang worked together in an attempt to kill an Indiana judge in hopes of derailing a domestic abuse case against one of their own, prosecutors alleged Friday, hours after police announced they had arrested five people in connection with the investigation.

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Steven Meyer, a Tippecanoe County Superior Court judge, and his wife, Kimberly Meyer, were injured Sunday afternoon in the attack at their Lafayette home. Steven Meyer suffered an injury to his arm and Kimberly Meyer an injury to her hip, according to authorities.

Probable cause affidavits unsealed Friday paint a sordid picture of a plan to attack the judge that unfolded over several weeks and how surveillance video, a trail of discarded clothing and a tip from a restaurant helped investigators piece the case together.

At the center of it all is 43-year-old Thomas Gregory Moss of Lafayette. The documents describe him as high-ranking member of Phantom MC, a Detroit-based motorcycle club with ties to the Vice Lords street gang.

Court records show Moss was charged in 2024 with beating his ex-girlfriend and firing a gun in her home. He was set to stand trial in that case Tuesday in front of Meyer.

A Lafayette woman named Amanda Milsap allegedly approached Moss’ ex-girlfriend at her home in Pennsylvania several weeks prior to Sunday’s attack. She told her that Moss and the Vice Lords wanted to pay her $10,000 not to testify against him.

Moss’ ex-girlfriend refused to accept the money. Raylen Ferguson, an affiliate of the Almighty Vice Lord Nation gang, and the woman he lives with, Zenada Greer, then traveled to Lafayette from Lexington, Kentucky, several days before the shooting, prosecutors allege.

Ferguson traveled to the Meyers’ home on Jan. 16 and knocked on the door saying he had a food delivery, but left, the records said. He returned to the home on Sunday afternoon, police said. The home’s surveillance video shows he was wearing and a mask and carrying a shotgun. Investigators later determined that another Phantom MC member, Blake Smith, had purchased the gun in early January, according to the records.

Ferguson knocked on the Meyers’ door and said he was looking for his dog. When Steven Meyer told him that he didn’t have his dog, Ferguson opened fire through the door, according to the records.

Police using a search dog later found the shotgun and Ferguson’s mask and clothes discarded near the Meyers’ home. Analysts matched DNA found on the mask to Ferguson.

Investigators used the home surveillance video to zero in on the food Ferguson brought to the Meyers’ house on Jan. 16 and tracked it to restaurant where Ferguson had bought it. The restaurant’s surveillance video showed a person who was dressed and walked like Ferguson leaving the restaurant.

Police from Indiana, Pennsylvania and Kentucky as well as U.S. marshals and the FBI worked on the case before the Lafayette Police Department finally announced late Thursday that Ferguson, Moss, Smith, Milsap and Greer all had been arrested.

Moss, 43, Ferguson, 38, and Smith, 32, each face attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, battery and intimidation counts. Milsap, 45, faces bribery and obstruction counts. Greer, 61, was charged with helping a criminal and obstruction.

Moss’ attorney in the domestic abuse case, Ben Jaffee, did not immediately return a message left at his office Friday. Court records did not list attorneys for the other four people facing charges in connection with the judge’s shooting.

Steven Meyer issued a statement thanking police and saying that it’s important to allow the judicial process to move forward.

Indiana Chief Justice Loretta Rush also released a statement saying a special judge appointment is expected Monday.

Threats against judges have been on the rise in recent years.

Rush noted in a news release that more than 150 of 214 judges who responded to a 2023 security survey said they had been threatened.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court recorded 188 threats against judges in that state in 2024, the most recent year data was available. That compares with 232 threats in 2023 and 74 threats in 2022. Retired Wisconsin state Judge John Roemer was shot and killed in 2022 by a man he had sentenced to prison for burglary.

The head of the U.S. Marshals Service said in congressional testimony in 2024 that the number of threats against federal judges had more than doubled over the last three years.

By JEFF AMY and CHARLOTTE KRAMON

ATLANTA (AP) — A federal judge in Georgia on Friday dismissed a U.S. Justice Department lawsuit seeking voter information from the state, ruling the federal government had sued in the wrong city.

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U.S. District Judge Ashley Royal found the government should have sued Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in Atlanta, and not in a separate federal judicial district in Macon, where the secretary of state also has an office.

Royal dismissed the lawsuit without prejudice, meaning the Justice Department can refile it. The department declined to comment Friday.

The Justice Department has now filed lawsuits against 24 states and the District of Columbia seeking voter information as part of its effort to collect detailed voting data, including dates of birth and driver’s license and Social Security numbers. A federal judge in California rejected the lawsuit against that state on privacy grounds, while a judge in Oregon has suggested he may dismiss the case there.

The Trump administration characterizes the lawsuits as an effort to ensure election security, and the Justice Department says the states are violating federal law by refusing to provide voter lists and information.

Raffensperger has been the rare Republican to decline the demand, saying Georgia law prohibits the release of voters’ confidential personal unless certain qualifications are met. Raffensperger argues the federal government hasn’t met those conditions. He says he shared the public part of the voter roll and information about how Georgia removes ineligible or outdated registrations in December.

“I will always follow the law and follow the Constitution,” Raffensperger said in a statement Friday. “I won’t violate the oath I took to stand up for the people of this state, regardless of who or what compels me to do otherwise.”

The refusal to hand over the records has become an issue in Raffensperger’s 2026 run for governor. Raffensperger in January 2021 famously refused a demand from President Donald Trump in a phone call to “find” enough votes to overturn Democrat Joe Biden’s win in Georgia’s 2020 presidential election. Many Trump-loving Republicans still hold a grudge against Raffensperger.

The issue flared just Thursday in a hearing by a state Senate committee where multiple Republican state senators slammed Raffensperger for failing to comply, saying he legally could do so. The committee voted along party lines to advance a resolution calling on Raffensperger to hand over the data and calling it the “latest example of a pattern of behavior by the secretary and his office to refuse oversight of his administration of Georgia’s elections.”

State Sen. Randy Robertson, a Republican from Cataula who filed the resolution, said the dismissal is “frustrating” because even if the Justice Department refiles the lawsuit, the problem will take longer to resolve.

“As public officials we all should participate in any investigation done by a law enforcement agency,” Robertson told The Associated Press Friday.

Robertson is one of many Republican lawmakers backing Lt. Gov. Burt Jones over Raffensperger for the GOP governor nomination. Jones, who already has Trump’s endorsement for governor, was one of 16 state Republicans who signed a certificate that Trump had won Georgia and declaring themselves the state’s “duly elected and qualified” electors.