A four-year old Texas boy found wandering across the border in Mexico this winter finally returned to the United States. Authorities believe his mother traveled from El Paso to Juarez to purposely abandon the child.
Over the weekend, the El Paso Police Department announced that the youngster found in the Mexican state of Chihuahua returned to the United States on Friday night. The four-year-old remained in the custody of social services in Juarez for more than four months.
The police department tweeted they placed the little boy into the care of Child Protective Services (CPS). Since then, though, it appears authorities reunited the child with his father in El Paso.
CAP – 4 year old boy found in Juarez was returned to the United States & CPS Friday evening. dp
— EL PASO POLICE DEPT (@EPPOLICE) July 1, 2017
Breitbart Texas reported that Mexican police found the boy wandering alone on the streets of Juarez on February 22. They suspected the child, purportedly named “Luis,” was American because of his command of the English language. Months later the El Paso Police Department identified the four-year-old as a U.S. citizen.
In fact, detectives in the south Texas border city only first learned about the boy in late May when an El Paso police supervisor in the Crimes Against Persons unit attended an Amber Alert seminar in Mexico City and heard about the child’s situation. Subsequently, on June 3, El Paso police issued a media alert about the unidentified boy. His mother, Ruby Esmeralda Gonzalez, 25 viewed photographs of her son on El Paso TV news broadcasts and then contacted police to report her child as a kidnapping victim.
An ensuing police investigation revealed Gonzalez crossed over the U.S.-Mexico border and into the city of Juarez on February 22 where, allegedly, she left her child in a dilapidated and deserted building. Gonzalez then returned to El Paso on the same day.
According to KVIA, a Juarez cab driver actually found the boy who was alone, scared, and hungry. The cabbie contacted local police who then took the child into custody. When investigators examined “Luis,” they noticed bruises on his head, legs, and buttocks.
Current El Paso jail records show that police arrested Gonzales on June 5 on one count of child abandonment with imminent danger and booked her into the El Paso County Detention Facility on a $10,000 bond.
On June 13, law enforcement officials charged her with filing a false report to a peace officer, federal special investigator, or law enforcement employee. This carries a $10,000 bond. On top of that, they charged Gonzalez with injury to a child with the intent of bodily injury which has a $25,000 bond. She remains incarcerated in the county jail.
Reportedly, before releasing “Luis,” Chihuahua police said the unidentified adult male had to take a DNA test in Juarez to prove he was the biological father. Investigators with the Mexican Attorney General’s office, officials from the United States Consulate in Juarez, and CPS authorities worked to bring the boy to home to his father, according to local Juarez newspaper El Diario de Juarez.
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