ROLLINS, Mont. (AP) — Throughout the 10-hour standoff between police and the man holding her captive in a rural lakeside cabin, 17-year-old Anne Sluti worked the phone, confidently relaying each side's reassurances and demands.
Finally, at about 3 a.m. Thursday, she made her captor speak with negotiators and agree it was time to give up.
Authorities on Thursday were calling the Nebraska honors student "very clever and very brave" and said she was instrumental in convincing Anthony Zappa, the man police say abducted her six days earlier, to surrender peacefully.
Zappa wouldn't speak to authorities surrounding the cabin until minutes before the surrender, but it was clear he was hovering over Sluti while she talked, Lake County Undersheriff Mike Sargeant said.
She never referred to Zappa by name until the end.
"Can I talk to Tony?" Sargeant asked.
"That's entirely up to him," Sargeant recalled Sluti saying.
"I could almost envision her thrusting the phone toward him, and she said 'Talk to them, Tony,' " he said.
Zappa's voice was almost a whisper when he spoke.
"I'm scared they're gonna shoot me," Zappa said, according to Sargeant. He made two demands: He didn't want officers to shoot him, and he wanted to serve his prison time in Minnesota.
Zappa, 29, also known as Anthony Steven Wright, was already wanted on charges including assault, theft and gun violations in Nebraska, Iowa, Wisconsin and Louisiana. He had eluded authorities since February for failing to appear in Minnesota on a burglary charge, and at one point, police closed the Mall of America near Minneapolis after he was spotted.
Late Thursday, another charge was added: kidnapping.
Witnesses had told police they saw a man hit Sluti over the head in the parking lot of a Kearney, Neb., mall on April 6, drag her into a vehicle and drive away.
On Wednesday, a landlord tipped off police to the cabin on Flathead Lake after reporting an unfamiliar car nearby. It took 10 hours of negotiations before Zappa emerged.
Sluti, who appeared unhurt except for a black eye, was reunited with her parents in Kalispell.
During the standoff, Baron said, some of the negotiators had concerns that Sluti might have been suffering from "Stockholm syndrome," in which a hostage may develop attachments to their captors.
"Personally, I think she was just very clever and very brave and was getting this guy to trust her," the sheriff said. "She was playing it so well."