New Mexico State Police pulled two men over on I-25 Thursday and found two kids in the luggage hold. They were charged with child abuse and kidnapping.
Officers from the New Mexico State Police (NMSP) pulled Antonio Guerra Garcia, 23, and Saul Rojas Villa, 40, over on I-25 Thursday morning and found a 13-year-old and a 5-year-old child in the SUV’s cargo hold, according to court papers. They were arrested.
Court records say that Garcia and Villa were driving in the outside lane of I-25 when an NMSP officer drove by and saw two people in the back who weren’t wearing seatbelts.
According to court papers, after pulling over the car, the officer walked up to it and saw that there were two children in the back.
According to court records, the officer talked to Garcia. Garcia told the officer that he was the uncle of both of the kids and that he and Villa were taking the kids to Mississippi to live with their moms.
After that, the officer called both of the kids’ moms. One of them said she had paid Garcia, a “close friend from childhood,” $2,500 to get the kids across the border from Juarez, according to court papers.
She is said to have also said that the kids should have turned themselves in to the border guard so that they could be taken to Mississippi, where she lives.
According to court documents, the officer apparently told the woman that wasn’t true. Garcia and Villa were pulled over more than two hours away from the closest border crossing while driving north on I-25.
They were both arrested and are being charged with child abuse and theft.