ESCAPED FUGITIVE ARRESTED

Larry R. Willis, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the Kentucky Office of the FBI advised that JOSHUA MICHAEL RIDINGS who escaped from the Warrick County, Indiana, jail on the evening of February 24, 2008, was arrested today without incident.

Willis stated that the FBI developed information today that RIDINGS was staying with an acquaintance at a mobile home park near Owensboro, Kentucky. Further investigation led law enforcement officers to a mobile home park outside of the Owensboro city limits. At approximately 1:10 p.m. (EST), FBI Agents along with members of the Owensboro, Kentucky, Police Department and the Davies County, Kentucky, Sheriff's Office, arrested RIDINGS at a mobile home in the 400 block of Reid Road, near Owensboro, Kentucky.

RIDINGS was indicted on January 8, 2008, by a federal grand jury in Clarksburg, West Virginia. RIDINGS is charged with the abduction of an 11 year-old girl from Wheeling, West Virginia, and sexually assaulting her in Belmont, Ohio. This incident occurred on February 20, 2007. It is alleged that RIDINGS, wearing only a pair of socks, approached the girl and asked her for directions. He then reportedly grabbed the girl and forced her into a vehicle, and drove her across state lines into Ohio, where she was sexually assaulted outdoors in sub-freezing weather.

Willis stated that RIDINGS is also wanted in connection with the sexual assault of a woman in Leitchfield, Kentucky, which occurred in August of 2006. RIDINGS allegedly, wearing only a pair of work boots, entered the victim's home through a back door and sexually assaulted her.

Willis credited the locating of and arrest of RIDINGS on the tenacious and cooperative efforts of the law enforcement agencies involved in the investigation. FBI agents along with members of the U.S. Marshal's Service; Kentucky State Police; Owensboro, Kentucky, Police Department; Davies County, Kentucky, Sheriff's Office; and the Warrick County, Indiana, Sheriff's Office, worked jointly on this matter in an effort to locate and arrest RIDINGS who was believed to be dangerous.