KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany — German police suspect that reports of two separate attempted child abductions in villages south of Ramstein Air Base are not true, a police spokesman said Friday.

Earlier this week, an 8-year-old boy in Linden, a village seven miles from the U.S. base, told police that a man tried to grab him off the street and bring him into his vehicle.

The claim was startlingly similar to that of an 11-year-old girl, who said a man last week tried to pull her into his car near Waldfischbach-Burgalben.

The allegations put German and American parents, children and teachers on alert for a possible serial child abductor in the area. At least one off-base day-care center warned parents to watch for possible child abductors.

But Arno Heeling, a spokesman for the German police headquarters in Kaiserslautern, said investigators have doubts about the two attempted abductions.

A female witness disputed the boy’s claims, and there are no witnesses in the girl’s case, he said.

The boy described the man who tried to grab him as between 30 and 40 years old, having an earring in his right ear and wearing sunglasses. He told police he was able to get away because two cars came in their direction and the man let him go.

Heeling said police are “90 percent sure” the alleged child abductions are false.