The mystery surrounding the disappearance of Loan Danilo Peña, a 5-year-old boy, keeps the entire nation of Argentina in suspense.
According to the criteria of
Loan was last seen on Thursday June 13, when he accompanied his father, José Peña, to lunch at the house of his paternal grandmother, Catalina Peña, located in the El Algarrobal area, a rural area in Nueve de Julio, Corrientes. Since then, there has been no news of her whereabouts.
According to the initial version, Loan would have gotten lost during an excursion to an orange tree located about 600 meters from Catalina’s house.. In this activity he was accompanied by his uncle-in-law, Bernardino Antonio Benítez, and a couple who were his friends, Daniel Ramírez, known as ‘Fierrito’, and Mónica Millapi.
However, none of the adults present were able to explain how and at what exact moment the child left the group. There were also other children there, but none of them could provide valuable information.
Also present at that lunch were a couple known to Loan’s grandmother: retired ship captain Carlos Pérez and former municipal official María Victoria Caillava. Both are now under investigation, suspected of having kidnapped the minor to deliver him to a human trafficking network.. Laudelina Peña, sister of Loan’s father and Benítez’s partner, took the last photograph of the family meeting, before the horror began.
Hypothesis 1: Loan is lost in the middle of the field
During the first days after the disappearance, the authorities focused their efforts on searching for the child under the hypothesis that he had been lost while picking oranges with Benítez, Ramírez and Millapi.
During the search operations, some objects belonging to Loan were found, such as a soccer cleat, although suspicions later arose that these findings could have been planted to reinforce the theory of loss. It is even doubted whether said excursion to the orange tree really occurred where it was claimed that the minor had been lost.
Loan never left Grandma’s house, he never left the garden, and the investigators never went to the orange tree. Gentlemen, they are all accomplices. Let’s keep spreading as much as possible until Loan appears. 👇🙏 pic.twitter.com/RNZp6mhQtb
— Diego Álzaga Unzué (@atlanticsurff) June 23, 2024
Hypothesis 2: Loan is kidnapped to be delivered to a trafficking network
The investigation took a dramatic turn when detectives began to consider a different version: that the former official Caillava and the retired Pérez would have kidnapped the child using a white Ford Ranger truck.
Said couple would have initially gone to a property in Nueve de Julio and then transferred to Loan in a red Ford Ka, a vehicle with which they traveled the next day to Resistencia, Chaco. The authorities are investigating whether they reached La Tigra, in Chaco, with the suspicion that at some point along the route they handed Loan over to a human trafficking organizationpossibly crossing it to Paraguay.
Raids, arrests and a macabre clue
Pérez and Caillava were arrested after traces of Loan’s odor were found in vehicles belonging to them, thanks to the work of sniffer dogs. This finding strengthens the theory that the child was transported in those vehicles to be delivered to a trafficking network.
Besides, There was a suspicious power outage on the afternoon of Thursday the 13thwhich prevented the operation of a security camera for approximately two hours, coinciding with the moment in which the couple returned home.
🚨 NOW
TWO NEW ARRESTS FOR THE LOAN CASE
– This is the municipal official Victoria Caillava and her husband Carlos Perez.
– Both were at lunch prior to the minor’s disappearance.
– The baby’s scent trail tested positive in the couple’s Ford Ka car. pic.twitter.com/JbRJC7o2H2— Via Szeta (@mauroszeta) June 22, 2024
The investigations led to several raids on the couple’s properties in both Corrientes and Chaco. In Pérez’s apartment in Resistencia, where he resides when he visits his daughter, weapons and ammunition were found. Eight fingerprints were also taken and will be analyzed to determine who they belong to.
The commissioner of Nueve de Julio, Walter Maciel was also arrested, accused of cover-up by focusing exclusively on the hypothesis of Loan’s loss and not investigating other possibilities.
“Progress was made with the matching of calls and the analysis of seized phones, we have important material, but we are not going to reveal it,” said Goya prosecutors Guillermo Barry and Juan Carlos Castillo at a press conference. The case was transferred to Federal Justice due to the seriousness of the crime of human trafficking.
🚨 LOAN DOES NOT APPEAR: IN THE PREVENTIVE PRISON THE PROSECUTORS LIST 55 EVIDENCES, AND DISTINGUISH ROLES
– In the photo, Victoria Caillava, her husband Carlos Pérez and the rest of the defendants before being sentenced to preventive detention.
– They resume raking in the area. pic.twitter.com/CVNv4QrGuB— Via Szeta (@mauroszeta) June 24, 2024
Outrage and pain
Loan’s disappearance has generated a wave of indignation and pain among the residents of Nueve de Julio, who have taken to the streets to demand the appearance of the minor. Loan’s family, along with numerous citizens, are crying out for justice and the truth about what happenedwaiting for the detainees to reveal the whereabouts of the child.
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*This content was rewritten with the assistance of artificial intelligence, based on information from La Nación, and was reviewed by a journalist and an editor.
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