[SIZE=+2]Mom is accused of hatching kidnap of tot on MySpace
[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]Web Posted: 04/10/2007 12:24 AM CDT
[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]Vianna Davila and Vincent T. Davis
Express-News[/SIZE] Ah, MySpace. A Web site to meet friends, try online dating or, in the case of a San Antonio mother, to orchestrate the abduction of a child, authorities allege.
Authorities said 20-year-old Lisa Gonzales recently used the popular networking site to post a message offering $500 to anyone willing to snatch her toddler son from her estranged boyfriend. Two people agreed to the scheme, and on Saturday night, authorities said, they took the screaming 2-year-old boy from the house he shares with his father and grandparents.
Chasing after the kidnappers, the boy's father, Vernardo "Ben" Morales, said Monday night that he nearly lost his mind watching his son get tossed into a vehicle that sped away.
"The first thing I thought was 'I'm going to murder this guy, I don't care what happens to me.' I just kept saying, 'I want to hurt this guy. He took my kid,'" Morales said in an interview at his home.
Two nights after he was abducted from the family's living room, where he had been playing on the floor with his 13-year-old uncle, Vernardo "Ben" Morales Jr. ran from room to room, stomping his tiny feet as he raced about. Dressed in a one-piece pajama outfit, the little boy giggled as he sat on his father's lap and played with a cell phone, a large bruise on his left thigh the only obvious sign of the trauma.
But Morales said that Junior, as he is called, was so shaken by the event that he refuses to go outside without his father or grandparents.
"We're all scared," Morales said, adding that he felt shocked and betrayed and couldn't understand how a mother could "put a price on her son's head."
According to statements given to investigators, Gonzales told the pair that she believed Morales was abusing their child. Authorities have contacted Child Protective Services about the case, they said, and Morales said Monday night that he plans to seek legal custody of both children.
Investigators quickly traced Junior's whereabouts to Gonzales around 2 a.m. Sunday, Bexar County sheriff's Sgt. Russell Mc****ter said. Soon after, Mc****ter said, they located others in connection with the solicitation, including an aunt of Gonzales who authorities said drove the young mother to a pizzeria to meet the pair who responded to her ad.
Each was charged with agreeing to abduct a child in exchange for compensation, a state felony. Gonzales, her 35-year-old aunt Jeanette Noah and 27-year-old Rosita Ybanez were released after posting $10,000 bonds. Reynaldo Galvan, 31, accused along with Ybanez of participating in the kidnapping, remained held on a $12,000 bond because he had two outstanding warrants, Mc****ter said.
Mc****ter said Gonzales and Morales, 19, broke up several months ago and share two children, Junior and a 1-year-old son. He said Gonzales also claims to be six months pregnant with their third child. The younger son lives with her, while the older boy stays with his father. But Gonzales apparently wanted guardianship of both children, although she had not applied for legal custody, the affidavit said.
Mc****ter said investigators believe Gonzales traded messages with the pair on MySpace.com a networking site that bills itself as a "place for friends" and concocted a plan to take Junior from her boyfriend's home in the 15000 block of Old Rosa Trail, a neighborhood of mobile homes near SeaWorld San Antonio.
And for a brief moment, authorities said, the networking efforts panned out.
After posting the solicitation message several weeks ago on her MySpace account an account that is registered as private and says nothing more than "I WANT MY SON JR BACK!!!" Galvan and Ybanez contacted Gonzales on Saturday, authorities said.
According to an arrest affidavit, Noah drove Gonzales to a Peter Piper Pizza in the 8200 block of Marbach Road later that day to meet with the pair, not long after taking $500 from a bank account that belongs to Gonzales' grandmother.
Authorities say Gonzales, while arranging the kidnapping, sent several text messages to Morales' older sister. At 4:09 p.m., she sent a note saying that she "bought Jr a basket and I'm going 2 take it later when my aunt gets off work at 7." At 4:21 p.m., she asked whether Morales was "going out 2nite."
An hour later at 5:28 p.m., she wrote, "if ur at ur moms tell ben I'll b there later."
Gonzales was there later, authorities said. At 9:29 p.m., she sent the final text: "where's jr," she asked.
Junior, about that time, was inside the trailer with the rest of his family. About 45 minutes later, according to the affidavit, Ybanez and Galvan peeked through a screen door and saw Junior on the living room floor.
Carrying a wooden stick, Galvan walked into the house and grabbed the boy just as Morales walked into the room, after being summoned by his 13-year-old brother, the affidavit said.
Galvan swung at him and ran toward the waiting vehicle, tossing Junior in before jumping in, according to the affidavit, and Ybanez drove from the scene as Morales shouted after them.
Moments later, according to the affidavit, they exchanged the boy for the money at a nearby convenience store where Gonzales and her aunt had waited, and the pairs went their separate ways.
