The former Red Wing, Minn., teenage girl who ran off with a self-professed 45-year-old vampire turned herself in to police Thursday morning.
Faribault, Minn., police Chief Dan Collins said Paige Brewer, 16, met with police after negotiations with an investigator. Collins said Jonathon "The Impaler" Sharkey, the 2006 Minnesota gubernatorial candidate who courted Brewer over the Internet, accompanied her.
Brewer was being detained in child protective services, "until we can determine what's going on," Collins said.
Her mother, Jillian Moen, alerted authorities to the case of the runaway teen earlier this week. Moen's mother was watching Brewer over the weekend at her Faribault residence when the youth slipped away sometime Sunday.
What followed included an unusual series of announcements over the Internet, where the romance was hatched.
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On Tuesday, Brewer was listed as an "endangered runaway" by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Collins said Sharkey, who dubs himself "king of the vampyre nation," does not face charges.
"We have no information that any crime has been committed," Collins said, but he added that county prosecutors will review the case for possible charges.
He said Sharkey was last seen waiting to catch a bus out of Faribault.
Moen said that once released into her custody, Brewer should be placed in a facility "to hold her against her will" and away from Sharkey until she turns 18. Sharkey was served by Moen on Thursday with a harassing-restraining order.
Moen said she's also attempting to set up a nonprofit group to lobby state lawmakers to increase the age of consent and to help other families in similar predicaments -- a challenge the single mother said she's eager to take on.
"They've finally met the biggest pain in the ass they've ever met," she said. "I'm sick to death of laws not protecting children."
Brewer and Moen lived in the Red Wing area for about seven years beginning in 2001.
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Sharkey listed his mood Thursday afternoon on a MySpace page as "betrayed."
"I know they're not very happy with us," Collins said, referring to Sharkey and Brewer.
Collins said Sharkey and Brewer likely felt as if the teen was lured back to Faribault under false auspices. He said she was probably under the impression her return would spur a reconciliation of domestic concerns with Moen.
In an e-mail this week, Brewer alleged parental abuse against her mother, allegations Moen said arose after Brewer became unruly.
The episode between people purporting to be Brewer and Sharkey played itself out on a CityPages blog, a platform Collins said presented challenges for police. For one, he said police couldn't be sure who was authoring the many posts.
"It took a turn for the surreal because of the Internet," he said. "That's a first for us."
Normally children utilize other, more established channels to deal with domestic issues, he said.
"This case just circumvented all that," he said.
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The Red Wing (Minn.) Republican Eagle and the Herald are Forum Communications Co. newspapers.
