According to the mother of the alleged kidnapper, an online romance led to the Danish girl’s trip to Hungary

After the case of a missing, then found 15 years-old Danish girl made international news, Átlátszó was able to contact the mother of the Hungarian man accused of kidnapping her. According to the mother, named Anita, her son developed an online relationship with the girl, who claimed to be over 18, and the two wanted to move in together. Anita’s husband accompanied his stepson to Denmark, from where they drove the girl back to Hungary. The husband died during the night after the arrest – Anita believes his death was caused by the shock from the incident.

“A 15-year-old teenager went missing in Denmark and was found in Hungary a few days later,” 24.hu reported on the evening of Friday, August 7, based on a statement released the previous day by the Danish police. The Hungarian quoted the National Police Headquarters (ORFK) as saying:

“On August 5, 2026, the Danish National Bureau of Europol contacted the Hungarian counterpart agency for assistance regarding a missing 15-year-old girl of Danish nationality who, according to their information, may be in Hungary. The missing minor was found unharmed on August 6 in Hajdú-Bihar County by officers from the Berettyóújfalu Police Station; according to our current information and the girl’s account, no crime was committed against her. The police ensured the girl’s safety and notified her relatives and the Danish authorities of her discovery.”

Neither the Danish nor the Hungarian police had released any information about the circumstances of the teenage girl’s disappearance, however, later, a Danish news portal revealed that the Hungarian police had located the girl in the village of Újiráz. From there, the details of the story began to unfold.

Újiráz is a village with a population of about 500 in Hajdú-Bihar County, in the Berettyóújfalu district. The village’s mayor, Károly Furák told Atlatszo, as well as Danish journalists cooperating with us that a local family – a 22-year-old man and his mother – was involved in the case. Attila, the man accused of kidnapping, and Anita, her mother said that the young man met the 15-year-old Danish girl online in January 2026, and they chatted until they fell in love.

According to them, the girl insisted all along that she was 18,

and she kept mentioning more and more often that she wanted to move in with the young man and start a family with him. So, early last week, Attila and his mother’s partner got in the car and drove to Denmark to pick her up.

Although the National Police Headquarters did not disclose how they found the Danish girl in a small village in Hajdú-Bihar County, she was most likely located based on their online communications. This is corroborated by Anita, who told us that one day after her son and his partner returned home from Denmark with the girl, the police called her to say they wanted to question Attila as a witness in a case, about which they gave no specific details over the phone.

Anita says that her son then went to the Berettyóújfalu Police Station, where the police asked him about the Danish girl and told him that she was only 15 years old. Meanwhile, she was waiting for Attila in the car in front of the station, so the police did not have to go far to find him. The police escorted the girl into the building, interviewed her, and examined her, and she told them – as both the ORFK statement and Anita emphasize – that no crime had been committed against her.

After that, they said goodbye to the man, and the police took the girl to the children’s home in Fót on a temporary basis, while Attila was allowed to go home.

Police claims kidnapping

Anita and her family thought that was the end of the story, but they were wrong. A few days after the girl was “found” by the police, the Budapest Metropolitan Court announced in a statement that

“police had ordered the provisional arrest and extradition of the 22-year-old man suspected of establishing a relationship with a 15-year-old Danish citizen with the intent of later committing sexual offenses against her.”

According to the Court’s statement, the Honses Municipal Court in Denmark issued a European arrest warrant against the man for the purpose of conducting criminal proceedings for “the crimes of kidnapping, unlawful detention or hostage-taking, exploitation of children, and child pornography.”

The Danish press reported on the court’s decision as early as Sunday, August 9 (by which time the girl was already home), noting that if the man is found guilty, he could face up to 12 years in prison.

According to an announcement by the Hungarian court on August 11, during the hearing held that day, the Hungarian man consented to his extradition to the Danish authorities, on the condition that no other criminal proceedings be initiated or continued against him for offenses other than those specified in the arrest warrant.

The Budapest Metropolitan Court ordered the man’s provisional detention pending extradition and will decide on his simplified extradition by August 21 – he will be extradited to Denmark only if the Danish authorities guarantee that, should he be sentenced to imprisonment there, he will be able to serve his sentence in Hungary rather than in a Danish prison.

The mother is completely devastated

Anita told Átlátszó on Wednesday, the day after her son’s arrest, that Attila is currently awaiting extradition in Budapest, in the 5th district, at the prison on Nagy Ignác Street. His mother is very worried about him; she says her son is in very poor condition, as he is suspected of extremely serious crimes that came as a complete surprise.

According to the woman, both she and her son were shocked when they learned from the police that the Danish girl was only 15 years old, since she had told them all along that she was of legal age, and if they had known she was not yet 18, they certainly would not have brought her from Denmark.

Anita added that they had wanted to speak with the girl’s parents before the trip, but the girl refused, citing a strained relationship with her mother and father. According to Anita, they had previously chatted with the girl on Snapchat, but since the authorities took her back to Denmark, they have not been in touch. Anita believes her parents do not let her contact them.

Anita’s life was turned upside down in the blink of an eye, and in addition to her son’s imprisonment, another tragedy struck her on Tuesday:

her partner, who had gone to Denmark with Attila to pick up the girl, passed away on Tuesday night.

The cause of death is unknown at this time; experts have promised to release the results of the investigation by Thursday, but Anita believes her retired partner, a German citizen, died of a heart attack caused by stress.

“They drove him to his death,” she says, crying on the phone, and then goes on to explain that her partner was terribly worried about Attila, who was taken into custody on Tuesday, and was rightly afraid that the authorities would also suspect her of kidnapping alongside the boy, since she had participated in bringing the Danish teenager to Hungary.

Anita’s only hope now is that the Danish girl will tell the court abroad the same thing she told the Hungarian police: she came to Hungary with Attila and his friends of her own free will; no one forced her, she was not kidnapped, and she was not harmed in any way – no sexual or other crimes were committed against her.

According to the woman, child pornography may have been included among the charges because the authorities found intimate photos in the messages exchanged between the two young people – something that, while very common in a relationship, may constitute a criminal offense because the girl is a minor.

However, the woman very much hopes that the case will be resolved soon and that her son will be released, because, she claims, he is innocent and has not committed any crime. Without him and her partner, the woman suddenly found herself with the ground slipping out from under her feet. With the loss of her partner and her son’s imprisonment, she was left alone with her younger, 9-year-old child, while also having to organize her partner’s funeral and prepare a care package for her son in prison.

In addition to losing her partner and Attila, her livelihood is now also at risk because she and her son had taken on home renovation projects together, with Attila doing the physical labor. She is unable to do that work herself, and as a result, she says she cannot complete the jobs she has been commissioned to do. Furthermore, the car the two men used to bring her from Denmark has been impounded by the police, which only makes her situation even more difficult.