Cottage Hills Man Captured in Southern Greene County on Kidnapping, Aggravated Battery Charges

By Benjamin Cox on October 10, 2019 at 8:49am

A Cottage Hills man was apprehended in southern Greene County yesterday after a 10-day manhunt. According to the Alton Telegraph, 33 year old Cody J. Eberlin of Cottage Hills had been sought by authorities since September 29th, accused of forcing a woman into a wooded area in Alton where he sexually assaulted her and choked her.

On Wednesday, Alton Deputy Police Chief Marcos Pulido said that Eberlin was arrested on Tuesday evening by Jerseyville Police and Jersey County Sheriff’s deputies in a rural wooded area along a set of railroad tracks near the Jersey-Greene County line after a brief foot chase. Alton Police and U.S. Marshals had received several leads on Eberlin’s whereabouts over the ten-day time frame.

Eberlin was being held at the Alton Police Department Wednesday for charges stemming from the domestic kidnapping incident. According to the Telegraph, Eberlin has an extensive record of domestic abuse, including domestic battery convictions in 2015 and 2017. in the current case, Eberlin is accused of carrying a woman into a wooded area of Alton from Wood River Township Park and choking her until she could not breathe. After a search, the woman was found safe but Eberlin has eluded police since the September 29th incident.

Eberlin also has a 2005 felony drug possession conviction in Jersey County, as well as convictions for misdemeanor resisting a peace officer, unlawful possession of a firearm and retail theft, according to court documents in Judici and Alton Telegraph reports.