Amber Alert canceled after 2 McKinney girls found safe, grandmother arrested, police say
McKinney police announced Sunday night that they safely recovered two missing McKinney girls and arrested their grandmother, who is accused of kidnapping them during a CPS-supervised visit with their father on Thursday.
Jessica Burns, 9, and her sister, 6-year-old Jennifer Burns “have been located and are safe this evening,” police said in a statement on social media.
The grandmother, 60-year-old Jame Burns, was taken into custody in Richardson, police said in the post shortly before 9 p.m. Sunday. She is facing two felony counts of kidnapping. The girls’ father also is facing charges in the case.
The Texas Department of Public Safety issued an Amber Alert on Friday morning for the girls after authorities said they were kidnapped by their grandmother during a supervised visit with their non-custodial father at a McKinney restaurant on Thursday evening.
Law enforcement officials said in the alert that they believed the children were “in grave or immediate danger.”
Officials said during a news conference recorded by KXAS-TV that the two girls had been in temporary CPS custody. They disappeared during a supervised visit with their father at a restaurant near Central Expressway and Virginia Parkway.
The CPS worker called 911 and the father, Justin Burns, was taken into custody at the restaurant. He was booked into the Collin County Jail and faces two counts of kidnapping, officials said.
Carla Marion Reeves, a spokesperson for the McKinney Police Department, said police believe the father was involved in the abduction.
Reeves said the grandmother who is believed to have abducted the girls has a criminal history.
According to court records, Jame Burns had been scheduled to be in court Friday morning on charges that she exposed the two girls and a third granddaughter to meth in 2021 when they were living with her and their father in Allen, KTVT-TV reported. She was attempting to flee the home with the children when an officer arrested her in that incident, the CBS station reported.
This story was originally published January 20, 2023 at 8:22 AM.
