Seen a Facebook post about a kidnapping at a Fort Worth mall? It's fake

A story circulating on Facebook and via email of an attempted "grab and go" kidnapping of a woman at Hulen Mall isn't true, say Fort Worth police and a Hulen Mall spokeswoman.

The account, which is claimed to have been emailed as a warning to all Fort Worth-area Lockheed Martin employees on Thursday night or Friday morning, says that a Lockheed Martin employee was at the mall Thursday night when "a guy tried to force me" outside. "The FW Police Dept. & Mall Security got a good description and they did a search for the individual but he got away."

Fort Worth police spokesman Tracy Carter said, "This is false."

Lindsay Kahn, a spokeswoman for GGP, Hulen Mall's parent company, elaborated: "These are things we take very seriously and we investigate them thoroughly, but I can assure you that this is false."

The posts and emails claim police are saying "a gang is working malls."

They claim that a man with a tablet takes photos of a targeted woman and sends them to a gang, instructing them to perform a "grab and go," in which "they force the victim to leave with them, once outside you are forced into a waiting van. The victim could be assaulted, robbed or sometimes worse."

This story was originally published April 13, 2018 at 1:32 PM with the headline "Seen a Facebook post about a kidnapping at a Fort Worth mall? It's fake."