Teen held captive after sexual assault, UT cops say. Then police track his phone

A phone app helped track down a teenager who was being held captive, Utah officials said.

On June 24, a dad reported his 15-year-old son missing, according to a Facebook post by the Vernal Police Department.

After using a tracking app, police were able to learn the teen’s location and made their way to an apartment complex in the city, officers said.

When the search began, the teen’s mom started getting text messages from the boy saying “he was being held against his will by a man he didn’t know,” officers told KSTU.

The teen heard his father yelling for him and decided to escape the apartment with police eventually finding him, officers told KUTV.

The teen told police he was going for a walk when 34-year-old Jose Torres grabbed him and took him to the apartment, officers told KUTV.

It was there the man sexually assaulted him, police said.

Torres was arrested and booked into jail on charges of sodomy, kidnapping, obstruction of justice and providing false personal information to the police, officers said.

Vernal is about a 170-mile drive southeast from Salt Lake City.

This story was originally published June 26, 2025 at 2:59 PM with the headline "Teen held captive after sexual assault, UT cops say. Then police track his phone."