A Texas father remains on the run with his 10-year-old daughter after failing to make a court appearance in McKinney last week.
Now, Michael Long has met secretly with a reporter from the London Daily Mail to say he will go to jail before returning the child to her mother who has legal custody.
In an exclusive interview, he also tells The Mail he will only surface with Sophie if he's promised a jury trial to air the details of the case.
Long insists he's protecting Sophie from the abuse he says she's suffered in the care of her mother.
In the interview, Long says he's been "laying low" with Sophie since early July after he was ordered to hand her over to a relative in North Carolina.
The Daily Mail reporter says Long brought Sophie to their meeting and that she "appeared happy and at ease with her father."
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