About a week later, Ms. Sorensen published a video on Instagram describing “the near abduction of her young children, adding significant details that had not been disclosed to the Petaluma Police Department,” prosecutors said.

In the video, which has since been deleted, she said she wanted to share her story to raise awareness “and to just encourage parents to be more aware of their surroundings.” She described being followed around the store by a couple who had made comments about the children and tried to kidnap them.

The video was viewed more than four million times, and Ms. Sorensen appeared on a local news program to repeat her account, drawing wider attention.

When Petaluma police officers followed up with Ms. Sorensen, she identified a couple from a surveillance video at the Michaels store as the alleged kidnappers.

The couple, Sadie Vega-Martinez and her husband, Eddie Martinez, who said they had been shopping at the store, “fully cooperated with the investigation” and “denied the allegations being made against them,” the Petaluma Police Department said at the time.