Alert system praised in teens' safe return

'For the most part, it worked extremely well'

A traffic billboard flashed an Amber Alert about the vehicle used to abduct two California teens who later were rescued.

LANCASTER, California (CNN) -- Law enforcement officials Friday credited California's "Amber Alert" for the safe recovery Thursday of two teenage girls 12 hours after their abduction in Los Angeles County.

Both teens were reunited with their families Thursday at Kern Medical Center in Bakersfield and later returned to their homes.

Police shot and killed suspect Roy Ratliff, 37, in a remote desert area 100 miles from their homes. Ratliff sexually assaulted both girls -- aged 16 and 17 -- and was probably only minutes away from killing them, authorities said.

He was already wanted on rape charges in Kern County, authorities said.

CNN NewsPass VIDEO One of the two teenage girls abducted at gunpoint describes how she and fellow kidnap victim had planned to kill perpetrator Roy Ratliff (August 2) Play video   MORE STORIES A CNN Access: Mark Klaas, founder of KlaasKids Foundation,  speaks with CNN's Paula Zahn about recent child abductions and killings.   EXTRA INFORMATION Gallery: Recent missing youngster cases     The Amber Alert A child abduction response system Uses radio, television, roadside electronic billboards and emergency broadcast systems to disseminate information about kidnapping suspects and victims soon after the crime is committed Solicits aid from the public to look for victims Used for children younger than 18 Employed when serious harm or death possible Named for 9-year-old Amber Hagerman of Arlington, Texas, who was kidnapped and killed in 1996 Source: Klaas Kids Foundation

The kidnapping ordeal began shortly before 2 a.m. Thursday when Joshua Brown, 18, and a 16-year-old girl heard a car pull into the Quartz Hill water tower parking lot. Moments later, Brown said, the suspect was at his window with a gun.

After demanding money and Brown's keys, the suspect taped Brown, 18, to a pole and prepared to leave. But another car, carrying a 17-year-old girl and a male companion, arrived on the scene. Ratliff allegedly taped the boy to his car seat, then fled with both girls in Brown's Bronco.

Officials received at least two calls from citizens who recognized a stolen white Bronco as it sped into Kern County. One of those callers reported the license number, Los Angeles County Assistant Sheriff Larry Waldie said.

Soon after the second sighting, an animal control officer spotted the Bronco. Helicopters dispatched to the area located the vehicle and alerted sheriff's deputies who were already in pursuit on the ground.

Waldie said the Amber Alert -- a new California missing child system that was used statewide for the first time in the hunt for the kidnapped girls -- was the key to bringing the youths home safely.

"For the most part, it worked extremely well," he said. "We got two teenage girls safe and alive because of it."

The Amber Alert was created in response to the murder of 9-year-old Amber Hagerman, who was kidnapped while riding her bicycle in Arlington, Texas, in 1996. She was later killed.

The California plan, put online on Friday, uses the emergency alert system to quickly distribute information on radio, television, the Internet and electronic traffic signs when a child under 18 is missing.

"It's almost instantaneous, getting information out regarding suspect, vehicle, victims that puts us out to literally millions of people," Waldie said.