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Fortunately they had a lead, and it was a good one. Ben's neighbor Mitchell Hults, 15, who rides the same school bus, told authorities he saw an unfamiliar white truck with a camper shell parked sideways near the Ownbys' home that afternoon. Three days later police working an unrelated case spotted a truck matching Mitchell's description in Devlin's apartment complex. The officers contacted the FBI, which staked out the apartment and raided it the next day after Devlin left for work. "Are you going to take me home?" Ben asked the FBI agents.
Craig Akers was driving home from work with his wife when they got a call from a prosecuting attorney. "He told me that he was 95 percent sure they had found Shawn," Craig told reporters. "It was just unreal." In Beaufort Don and Doris Ownby were sitting down to do a TV interview in their home when a sheriff arrived. "He said, 'We got him,' " remembers Doris. "I said, 'What do you mean?' I wasn't sure if we got the bad guy or Ben. Once he said Ben, I screamed." Before rushing out to get his son, Don Ownby grabbed a pack of multiflavor Dentyne gum from Ben's room. "It's his favorite," he says. "I was saving it for him."
