this post was submitted on 23 Sep 2024
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314
Six-year-old abducted from California park in 1951 found alive after seven decades (www.theguardian.com)
submitted 2 months ago by girlfreddy@lemmy.ca to c/news@lemmy.world
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A man who was abducted as a six-year-old while playing in a California park in 1951 has been found more than seven decades later thanks to the help of an online ancestry test, old photos and newspaper clippings.

The Bay Area News Group reported on Friday that Luis Armando Albino’s niece in Oakland – with assistance from police, the FBI and the justice department – located her uncle living on the US east coast.

Albino, a father and grandfather, is a retired firefighter and Marine Corps veteran who served in Vietnam, according to his niece, 63-year-old Alida Alequin. She found Albino and reunited him with his California family in June.

On 21 February 1951 a woman lured the six-year-old Albino from the park in West Oakland, where he had been playing with his older brother, and promised him in Spanish that she would buy him candy.

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[–] norimee@lemmy.world 101 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Oakland police acknowledged that Alequin’s efforts “played an integral role in finding her uncle” and that “the outcome of this story is what we strive for”.

That's a really weird statement. Oaklands police strives for no leads and a cold case for 70 years, leaving the mother in uncertainty until her death and then the family finding the missing person themselves?

I mean its great, that he was found well and alive, but if that is what your police strives for... the bar is like underground.

[–] rand_alpha19@moist.catsweat.com 27 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Aren't police clearance rates for missing persons and murder cases like, in the low single digits? Cops aren't good at this.

[–] jonne@infosec.pub 21 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It's like 1-2% for pretty much any crime. They're basically there because you need a police report to make an insurance claim.

[–] rand_alpha19@moist.catsweat.com 14 points 2 months ago

Yeah, I've heard about the same. Roughly 2% even for violent crime. And yet revisiting their budgets is apparently fucking communism.

[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Cops aren’t good at this.

They're not magically omniscient, if that's what you mean. You've set a really high bar for American cops, who are continually accused of being violent and stupid.

[–] rand_alpha19@moist.catsweat.com 11 points 2 months ago

The bar isn't really that high if you look at how cases that are solved actually got solved (deductive reasoning, forensic analysis, trust from the community including the marginalized, and focused manpower from people who give a fuck).

It's just that the people who want to be cops are more interested in wearing a fancy uniform, using weapons, harassing poor people, and beating their spouses than actually doing real work that involves brain power. Not to mention office politics.

Magic omniscience would probably help though. They should work on that after solving the "violent and stupid" issue. ;)

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 23 points 2 months ago

It's not all that weird when you remember that ACAB.

[–] lolcatnip@reddthat.com 17 points 2 months ago (2 children)

On the plus side, the cops didn't murder anyone this time.

[–] Gradually_Adjusting@lemmy.world 7 points 2 months ago

I guess we can be sure the family doesn't own a dog.

[–] pyre@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago

it probably helps that it's the albino family.

[–] Dudewitbow@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

keep in mind this case was only solved because the neice did a DNA ancestry test and found a nearest match. If police wanted this data, they either would have needed to ask said family to turn in DNA (which id imagine back then, wasnt a service at this scale) or to give them 100% access to DNA data of every citizen, which I doubt anyone wants.

[–] norimee@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago

I'm not criticising that police couldn't find him themselves. My issue is with the statement, that this is an outcome they "strive" for as if finding him after 70 years (SEVENTY) was an ideal outcome in a child abduction case. As if this was the most they aim for.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 83 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The article was a bit frustrating because it said nothing about what the man's thoughts were after being abducted and now. Does he even remember being abducted? Did he realize he wasn't living with his birth parents?

[–] Cardboardboxo@sopuli.xyz 16 points 2 months ago

Everything I could find online says he did not want an interview and that it's not confirmed if the person who raised him was the same who kidnapped him. It only mentions that the adults in his life did not answer any questions he had about it. We likely won't know unless he decides to do an interview or the FBI's investigation turns up something.

[–] dogslayeggs@lemmy.world 49 points 2 months ago (1 children)

This story is frustratingly light on details. What happened to the woman who took him? How did he end up with his adoptive parents (did they legally adopt him from that woman or did they adopt him after she abandoned him)? Did he know he was adopted?

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 11 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Did he know he was adopted?

I wonder how he wouldn't have. The story says he was six when he was abducted. I learned how to read when I was five and knew my own address at six.

How did he never like, just say "I'm not from here, please take me home"? I know America is big, but...

[–] Jimmyeatsausage@lemmy.world 7 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I imagine being kidnapped is a pretty traumatic event, and it's pretty easy to gaslight a child even if they haven't been traumatized. If every adult in your life keeps telling you you imagined something or dreamed it, it probably sticks after a few years.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago

You might be right. I find it dubious, but I think you might be.

[–] Drusas@fedia.io 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I would agree, but I've known a couple of people who swear that they don't remember early childhood at all, like nothing before the age of eight or nine, or only the vaguest of images here and there. I was skeptical at first because my earliest memory is from the age of two, and it's fairly clear. It blows my mind that it's even possible to forget everything without a head injury or something, but I didn't have any reason to believe they were lying.

Edit to add: I'm always a little thrown off when I see your username. Just for a second.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago

Yeah memory is a funny thing I guess. But like, it seems that there would've needed to be at least a few years of someone actively blocking the kid from going home if he knew were home was, until he could be gaslighted into believing the new one.

Edit to add: I'm always a little thrown off when I see your username. Just for a second.

Took me a while. I was looking at mine, thinking what's wrong, why would you be thrown, but then I saw yours and I totally got it.

[–] Deceptichum@quokk.au 25 points 2 months ago (1 children)

That’s disgusting, I hope that woman lived a short, painful and miserable life.

[–] Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works 39 points 2 months ago (1 children)

And I hope the couple who adopted him gave him love. (It doesn't say whether they knew he'd been stolen, they lived on the opposite coast so it wouldn't have been in their newspaper.) Glad he and his brother were able to reconnect, after all the lost decades

[–] Dudewitbow@lemmy.zip 7 points 2 months ago

its only assumed yeah that the parents were financially well off because it was a common thing back then (and is still prevelent today) where couples would adopt children, not knowing that they were victims of child trafficking.

[–] AmidFuror@fedia.io 23 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Did he ultimately get the candy or not?