Kidnap suspect 'Rockefeller' gives NBC interview

[August 22, 2008]  BOSTON (AP) -- A man using the name Clark Rockefeller says in an upcoming television interview that he had hoped to live an "obscure life" in Baltimore with the 7-year-old daughter he's accused of kidnapping in a custody snatch.

Christian Gerhartsreiter (GAYR'-hahrtz-ry-tur), a German immigrant who assumed the Rockefeller name, says on the NBC "Today" show that he wasn't sure he would return his daughter, Reigh Boss, back to her mother, Sandra Boss, who lives in London.

"I hadn't really thought about it. Just being together with her was, almost as if, almost, almost like a drug," he said. His attorney has said he was a primary caretaker for the child during his marriage, which ended last year.

A brief excerpt of his first public interview, to be aired on the "Today" show beginning Monday, was shown Thursday night on Boston's NBC affiliate, WHDH-TV.

Gerhartsreiter is accused of taking his daughter during a supervised visit with a social worker in Boston on July 27. She was found safe at a home in Baltimore where he was arrested Aug. 2. He has pleaded not guilty to charges in Boston of kidnapping the girl and assaulting the social worker.

California authorities want to question Gerhartsreiter about the 1985 disappearance of a wealthy young couple who lived at a Los Angeles area estate where he rented the guesthouse. His attorney has said he remembers the couple but had nothing to do with their disappearance.

Gerhartsreiter said in the NBC interview he took his daughter to Baltimore because he could not afford the life he wanted in Boston.

Asked if he planned to go into hiding, he said "That's perhaps an extreme way of saying it. I just wanted to live an obscure life in Baltimore."

He said he has been using the name Clark Rockefeller as long as he can remember. "It was given to me by the one person to whom I've always looked up to, one person whom I've known since I was small," he said.

He said he would not name that person on advice of his lawyer Stephen Hrones, who sat with him in the interview at Boston's Nashua Street Jail. His attorney has said his client doesn't remember being Gerhartsreiter.

Authorities have said Gerhartsreiter lived all around the U.S., including California, Wisconsin and Massachusetts, using several aliases. People who knew a German student in Connecticut in the early 1980s also say he was the same man.

During his marriage, Gerhartsreiter also had homes in Boston and New Hampshire with his wife and daughter.

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Information from: WHDH-TV, http://www1.whdh.com/

[Associated Press; By JAKE COYLE]

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