The discovery of a man wearing only socks while standing on the side of Pleasant Valley Road early Friday morning has resulted in the arrest of a Boise man for second-degree kidnapping.
Clifford M. Cole is also charged with felony counts of aggravated battery and robbery in connection with the case.
Deputies arrested the 46-year-old Cole outside his Boise home Monday morning and booked him into the Ada County Jail, where he is being held on a $500,000 bond. A preliminary hearing is set for Jan. 3.
Deputies began their investigation just after 3:30 a.m. Friday. An Idaho Department of Correction employee driving down Pleasant Valley Road saw a naked man standing on the side of the road just past the Hollilynn Drive Intersection. The naked man was also bleeding from the head.
It was snowing and the temperature was 31 degrees when the man was found wearing only his socks. The IDOC employee called dispatch and took the man to the nearest facility to get him out of the elements as soon as possible. Paramedics took him to a local hospital for treatment.
Deputies later determined the man was driven out to the desert a short time before and forced to take off his clothes by another man, later identified as Cole, who was angry about an unpaid debt.
The man said Cole stole the his backpack, which had his cell phone and a laptop, and then hit him in the head with the butt of a handgun and threatened further injury if he didn’t pay.
The man said Cole then drove away and left him off the side of the road.