NORTH HUNTINGDON MAN ARRESTED ON KIDNAPPING AND BEATING CHARGES

A North Huntingdon man was arrested yesterday in connection with a kidnapping and brutal beating in 2020. The Trib reports that DNA evidence was used to identify 59-year-old Danny Jo Lambert as one of two suspects in the incidents in Herminie and Rillton. The man told state police that he was walking outside the Veterans of Foreign Wars post in Rillton about 8:30 p.m. when an SUV stopped and he was grabbed by two men wearing masks. They demanded a card related to a pandemic unemployment assistance claim, but the man didn’t have one, police said. Court documents say He was driven to an abandoned house about 2 miles away in Herminie and taken to the basement where authorities said he was beaten, hogtied with extension cords and threatened to be buried alive in a coal cellar and have his fingers cut off with an axe. The victim was later freed. Lambert is free on $50,000 bail, and is due in court March 4th for a preliminary hearing. Police are still looking for the identity of a second suspect, and if you have any information, call police at 724-832-3288.