The anonymous caller would always say the same thing to the people on the other end: "Please help before I rape the baby."
Now local investigators are crediting intense police work as well as "good luck of the draw" in the apprehension late Thursday of Donald Allen Davis, 47, who is accused of making threatening prank calls for years to public agencies across the nation from Hamilton County pay phones.
"Luckily we were able to play his game and catch up to him," Chattanooga police Lt. Kim Noorbergen said Friday.
Mr. Davis, a resident of Bradley County, is charged with nine felony counts of filing a false report and has admitted to making the phone calls, police said.
At least 30 calls in recent months went to businesses out of state such as hospitals and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
His criminal history shows arrests in Florida and Colorado for "obscene communications and harassing phone calls" with at least 23 different charges from 1982 to 1995.
Police removed a 2-year-old from Mr. Davis' residence during his arrest Thursday night, but say there is no evidence the child ever has suffered from sexual abuse.
Bradley County 10th Judicial District Attorney General Steve Bebb said Bradley authorities moved quickly with arrest warrants "because we felt like he needed to be in jail."
But indictments by a Hamilton County grand jury likely will follow, Mr. Bebb said.
Mr. Davis currently is being held on a $250,000 bond at the Bradley County Jail and will appear at a preliminary court hearing March 30.
Lt. Noorbergen said that for years the Chattanooga Police Department would periodically receive information related to an anonymous caller in the area from other police departments, but investigators always arrived at the target phone booths too late to catch the suspect.
Then investigators caught a break after staking out several pay phones across the city to where the calls had been traced.
Help outPolice are asking if there are any other victims in the area to listen to the audio online then call the Chattanooga Police Department at 698-2525 or the Bradley County Sheriff's Office at 476-0678 with the information.
During one of the stakeouts, someone drove up and made a call from a pay phone at the Family Dollar on Willow Street, Lt. Noorbergen said.
Police traced the vehicle tags to Mr. Davis, made an undercover recording of his voice and compared it to the voice of the person who had made a call to a Pennsylvania business from the Family Dollar pay phone on the same day and time Mr. Davis' car was there.
"This was a very intense investigation with a lot of man-hours spent on identifying and apprehending this dangerous individual," Chattanooga Assistant Police Chief Bobby Dodd said in a written statement.