A 34-year-old Bellevue woman pleaded not guilty Monday (Sept. 21) to charges she attempted to kidnap a 2-year-old boy from his mother’s arms Sept. 7 outside an auto-parts store on Rainier Avenue.

Carrie Ann Clark was arraigned Monday at the Norm Maleng Regional Justice Center in Kent on charges of second-degree attempted kidnapping and fourth-degree assault.

Clark is being held on $75,000 bail at the King County Jail in downtown Seattle; the judge denied her request for a lower bail at the arraignment. Her next court appearance is 1 p.m. Oct. 1 at the justice center.

About an hour after the alleged assault, Clark was arrested near the Fred Meyer Garden Center on Rainier Avenue where she was spotted by an employee of the auto-parts store who had come to the mother’s aid.

The mother was walking with her three children and their dog through the O’Reilly Auto Parts parking lot  at about 5:40 p.m. Their dog walked over to a car in which Clark was sitting and a dog inside began to bark, according to court documents.

The mother apologized and walked on with her children.

As the mother walked past the car, Clark got out and yelled, “That’s my kid,” according to court documents. She grabbed for the boy; the mother picked him up. Clark repeatedly hit the mother in the head while yelling “That’s my boy.”

After several strikes, Clark grabbed the boy’s left arm and managed to wrest him from his mother, who later told officers she let go because Clark “was pulling on him so hard I didn’t want him to get hurt.”

The mother told her two other children to hide behind a tree. She then started to hit Clark to try to rescue her son, who was now in Clark’s arms. The mother hit Clark in the face, who then dropped the child.

An employee of the nearby O’Reilly Auto Parts store witnessed the “attempt to kidnap” the child and came to assist the mother, according to charging documents. Clark then assaulted him, according to documents, and fled when he threatened to call police.

A search failed to find Clark, but the employee later spotted her at Fred Meyer. Officers ordered her to stop, but she said “What for? I didn’t do anything.” Despite orders to stop, she continued to walk away. Eventually, it took three officers to control her. She’s 5-foot-3 and weighs 105 pounds.

As she struggled, she said, “I’m the only woman in the world. Look it up. You’ll see.” And she said, “I am the mother. That’s my son.”

Officers couldn’t arrest her, she said, because she is a woman.