Kidnappings and disappearances are stories that all too often end in heartache and loss in Mexico. But this was not the case for two parents emotionally reunited with their seven-year-old son this week.
Four days after he was abducted in Guadalajara’s Plaza Tapatia, Jesus Daniel Carrasco Martinez was returned to parents Anibal Janoy Carrasco de la Mora and Irma Sarai Martinez Montes on Sunday.
Carrasco was kidnapped by a man who offered to buy him a ball last Wednesday, in the plaza in downtown Guadalajara where his mother tends an artisan stall. His parents led a well publicized campaign to find him, leading the abductors to return the boy to the same plaza on Sunday morning.
Carrasco was discovered wandering disorientated around the square by a friend called Ivan and his father Basilio Salazar Lopez, 55, who took him to a police unit. An inspection by Green Cross parademics showed he was in good health and showed no signs of mistreatment.
After being interviewed at the Jalisco Attorney General’s Office (PGJEJ), Carrasco was finally returned to his family in a tearful reunion on Sunday night. His mother thanked the authorities, media and general public for helping to locate her child.
Carrasco first told authorities that he spent the time playing with his “girlfriend,” a woman apparently in charge of feeding him, then changed his story to say he was with a “friend,” who treated him well. State Attorney General Tomas Coronado Olmos said they brought in a psychologist to help ascertain the truth.
“The psychologist said it is normal for a child of seven years to give different accounts,” Coronado said, adding that investigators are giving the boy time to tell the true version of events. In both accounts, Carrasco said he was watching television with his captors when his face came on the news, prompting their decision to return him.
Footage from surveillance cameras shows he was accompanied back to the Plaza Tapatia by a man and a woman in a taxi. Carrasco was found dressed in new clothing, glasses and a hat that the kidnappers had bought for him, the PGJEJ confirmed.