Suspect chose Jayme Closs when he saw her on the school bus

Jake Thomas Patterson has been charged with kidnapping, two counts of first-degree intentional homicide and armed burglary in the abduction of 13-year-old Jayme Closs and the slaying of her parents.

A criminal complaint says Patterson spotted her getting on a school bus one day and made up his mind to take her.

Patterson told investigators he was driving to his job at a cheese factory one day near Almena, Wisconsin, when he stopped behind a school bus and watched Jayme get on.

The complaint quotes Patterson as saying when he saw Jayme, “He knew that was the girl he was going to take.”

The complaint says Patterson went to the Closs home twice with the intent of taking Jayme but was unable to do so because too many people were around before he was able to kidnap her.

The complaint also states that Jayme and her mother hid in the bathroom as Patterson came to the front door. They heard a gunshot and knew Patterson had killed her father.

Patterson then broke down the bathroom door, shot her mother and taped Jayme’s hands and ankles. He then dragged her to his car and threw her in the trunk. Patterson warned Jayme Closs “bad things could happen to her” if anyone found her at his cabin.

Jayme was forced to go under a bed in Patterson’s cabin and that he would stack totes, laundry bins and barbell weights around her so she couldn’t move without him noticing. She was kept up to 12 hours at a time with no food, water or bathroom breaks.

Jayme escaped Thursday after Patterson made her go under the bed and told her he was going to be gone five or six hours. It says she pushed the bins away, crawled out, put on a pair of his shoes and fled the house.