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Suspect in school bus stop kidnapping, rape: 'It looks like I'm a monster, and I'm not'

DNA evidence led authorities to charge a 39-year-old Haw River man Monday with abducting a girl from a Mebane school bus stop last fall and sexually assaulting her.

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MEBANE, N.C. — DNA evidence led authorities to charge a 39-year-old Haw River man Monday with abducting a girl from a Mebane school bus stop last fall and sexually assaulting her.

Greg Daniel Overman, of 128 Second St., was charged with felony statutory rape of a child by an adult and felony statutory sex offense with a child by an adult, according to the Alamance County Sheriff's Office.

Overman was initially jailed under a $75,000 bond, but a judge raised the bond to $200,000 during a Tuesday afternoon court hearing.

Alamance County District Attorney Pat Nadolski sought a $1 million bond, calling Overman a threat to the public and to himself. Nadolski said that Overman had tried to kill himself in jail early Tuesday.

"It looks like I'm a monster, and I'm not," a sobbing Overman said in court. "I didn't do this. It wasn't like this."

An 11-year-old girl was waiting for a school bus on Oct. 11 when a man kidnapped her. She said he drove her to an area near the Orange County line and sexually assaulted her. Alamance County Sheriff Terry Johnson said he wasn't sure how the girl got away, but she was eventually able to flag down a passing driver, who took her back to the bus stop where she spoke with deputies.

The Alamance County Sheriff's Office said the FBI helped crack the case by expediting the analysis of the DNA samples from a rape kit. The findings came back last week and matched Overman, whose DNA was already on file.

Overman's previous criminal record included six other felony convictions and other misdemeanors dating to 1995, Johnson said.

"When you got a man with six past felony convictions and I don't know how many misdemeanor convictions that has had sex with an 11-year-old, he should never see daylight, in my opinion," Johnson said at a news conference.

Deputies had to go to 10 different residences to find Overman on Monday, Nadolski said.

Investigators are now looking at his cellphone records and are trying to find the vehicle used in the kidnapping, where authorities say at least some of the sex crimes happened.

Overman admitted to having sex with the girl but claimed they had a prior relationship, Nadolski said, but there's no other evidence to support that.

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