A boy who was abducted from a California park at just six years old has miraculously been found alive 73 years later… on the other side of the country.
On February 21, 1951, six-year-old Luis Albino was playing in a West Oakland park with his older brother when he was approached by an older woman.
The woman told the Puerto Rico-born youngster that she would buy him candy if he went with her.
From that moment, the course of the child’s life changed forever, as he was abducted and flown to the East Coast. There, he was raised by a couple who claimed he was their own son.
At the time, a huge search was conducted by not only local police, but soldiers from the Oakland Army Base, the Coast Guard, the FBI, and city employees.
Luis’ 10-year-old brother, Roger, was questioned multiple times, but each time, he stressed that his brother was taken by a woman with a bandana wrapped around her head. Sadly, nobody could find Luis.
Despite more than seven decades passing since Luis was taken, his family never gave up hope that he was alive and would one day be found.
Tragically, Luis’ mother passed away in 2005 – but other family members kept up the fight, including a very persistent niece who played a huge part in finally tracking him down.
Alida Alequin, a 63-year-old Oakland resident, had spearheaded the family’s mission to finally find Luis – and she did. Studying newspaper clippings and relying on DNA testing, the kidnapped boy was found living on the East Coast.
In 2020, Alequin decided to take a DNA test for fun, The LA Times reports, and it resulted in a 22% match with a man on the East Coast. She didn’t know it at the time, but it would turn out to be her long-lost uncle. It wasn’t until she was randomly recalling her family members to her daughters that it suddenly clicked that the man Alequin found on Ancestry could be her missing uncle.
He is a retired firefighter, Marine Corps and Vietnam veteran, father, and grandfather — but it was Luis, the boy who went missing all those years ago.
In June, Luis was finally reunited with his family in an incredibly emotional reunion in California. When Luis finally embraced his niece, he told her: “Thank you for finding me.”
Per The LA Times, when asked about Luis mother and her hope of one day finding her son, Alequin said: “She always had hope that he would come home”.
Up until her death, Luis’ mom kept a photo of her son hanging in her living room and a newspaper clipping detailing his kidnapping in her purse.
Police in Oakland have since acknowledged that Alequin efforts “played an integral role in finding her uncle.”
Luis was also reunited with his brother, Roger, who was there the day he went missing.
They spoke about their childhood and bonded over their respective time in the military.
Sadly, Roger passed away shortly after their reunion. But just how incredible is it that he was finally able to reunite with his little brother one last time?
A truly emotional and remarkable story.