DUNSEITH - Two young children escaped injury here early Thursday morning when a 16-year-old boy reportedly stole the car they were sitting in and drove away with the children inside.

Michelle Allery, 27, who works at AmeriCare in Rugby, had buckled her 4-year-old son Jason Davis and 3-year-old daughter Halen Davis into their car seats in her 2001 Pontiac Grand Am at about 5:30 a.m. and had gone back inside her residence to get her 11-month-old baby Zayer Grant. When she came out of the house with the baby, she saw her car pulling away with the kids in the back seat.

"It was just a matter of minutes," she said late Thursday morning, voice shaking.

Allery lives behind the Jack and Jill grocery store in Dunseith, along an alley. She said she was running after the car when the driver stopped the car for a moment at the corner of that alley and "threw" 3-year-old Halen out the car window. Then he took off again, with her son still in the car.

Meanwhile, Allery's boyfriend, Justin Grant, heard her screaming and came outside. Allery told him to call the police, grabbed the keys to her other vehicle, jumped in and drove off in the direction the driver had been headed in. She kept trying to call the police on her cell phone, but couldn't get reception. She chased the car down the road by Dunseith High School. The driver pulled over again and put her crying, terrified 4-year-old son out on the side of the road. Allery said she grabbed Jason and put him in the vehicle she was driving. Meanwhile, the 16-year-old driver repeatedly called her "auntie," saying "I'm sorry, Auntie. I'm sorry, Auntie."

Allery said she does not know the boy and is not related to him.

"He was on frickin' drugs," Allery recalled. "He had no frickin' clothes on. He was all beat up."

Allery got in her other vehicle and drove off with her son. By this time, she had contacted other relatives and law enforcement had been notifed, but the 16-year-old driver had already taken off again.

He was ultimately found at a baseball diamond behind Dunseith High School, having allegedly driven across the field, through the baseball dugout and crashed into a fence, totaling the car. The 16-year-old was found clinging to the fence and was nude, said Rolette County Sheriff Tony Sims.

Sims declined to identify the boy, but said he is facing multiple charges in juvenile court, among them auto theft, kidnapping, driving without a license, consumption of alcohol, property damage and others. Sims said the boy could easily have hurt someone and he's glad the boy put Allery's children out of the car and crashed the vehicle, because it could have ended badly if he'd forced a pursuit. Sims plans to recommend that his case be transferred to adult court.

Allery took her children to the emergency room to be checked out for injuries.

Sims said the boy sustained minor cuts and was evaluated at the Indian Health Service. He briefly escaped from IHS, was recaptured, and was transferred to the correctional center in Devils Lake and was to have a detention hearing later Thursday afternoon. Another court date will be set later, Sims said.

Sims said there's a pick up order for the boy from Grand Forks. He's not from Dunseith, said Sims.

Sims said he's been told the baseball dugout was worth about $350 and is not sure of the total amount of damage to the rest of the baseball field and fence.