Boulder County sheriff’s deputies arrested a 42-year-old transient Monday afternoon on suspicion he abducted two local hikers at gunpoint near Nederland over the weekend.
Joseph Scott Carter had been camping in the forest for a couple of weeks, the Sheriff’s Office said in a statement.
He was found near the Peak to Peak Highway and matched the description given by the man and woman he is suspected of accosting with a rifle. The man then bound them to trees.
The 44-year-old Berthoud man escaped, and the 32-year-old woman from Fort Collins was set free Saturday afternoon on a trail in the 38000 block of the Peak to Peak Highway.
Carter is being held in the Boulder County Jail.
On Saturday and Sunday, SWAT officers and other law-enforcement personnel combed the forest but found nothing. Some campers were evacuated, and residents were alerted to avoid the area.
Carter has had only minor run-ins with local authorities before. Public records show he was arrested in Longmont in March and pleaded guilty to a petty offense, making unreasonable noise.
He pleaded guilty to having fictitious license plates in Boulder County in 1992.
By Joey Bunch, The Denver Post
