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Mistreated? Abducted? Police aren't saying

For now, they are focused on reuniting 12-year-old Margarita Aguilar-Lopez with her parents in Mexico.

By CURTIS KRUEGER and EDDY RAMIREZ
Published April 29, 2005

BRADENTON - The 12-year-old missing Bradenton girl who was found this week in South Carolina was returned to Florida late Thursday as authorities continued to search for her parents in Mexico.

Bradenton police chief Michael Radzilowski said Margarita Aguilar-Lopez was flown back to Florida by the FBI and was taken to a safehouse.

Manatee County sheriff's spokesman Randy Warren said the agency's child welfare staff was planning to try to reunite the girl with her parents.

"We're working with the Mexican consul to locate the parents right now," Warren said.

Margarita's disappearance earlier this week triggered an Amber Alert and a search throughout Florida and much of the Southeast. Margarita had been living with two older brothers in Bradenton. She was found on Wednesday in Easley, S.C., with a 25-year-old man, Antonio Paulino-Perez, and police were still trying to determine if she had gone with him willingly or otherwise.

Perez was being held on $500,000 bail in South Carolina, said Easley Detective Lt. Gene Patterson. He said Paulino-Perez had waived extradition and would be returned to Florida. He faces a charge of interfering with parents custodial rights, a felony.

The FBI is assisting with the investigation, but no federal charges have been filed against Perez, said spokeswoman Sara Oates.

Police in Easley also interviewed another man in connection with Margarita, Arturo Lopez, but he was not charged, according to the Bradenton Herald.

Margarita and her brothers are in the United States illegally, but none of the law enforcement officials contacted Thursday were aware if formal deportation proceedings would begin. The first step, Warren said, is to work with the girl's parents in an effort to reunify them.

Paulino-Perez and Margarita's brothers had worked together at one point. At a migrant farm in Ruskin, Paulino-Perez's family expressed concern.

One of his three brothers, Silvino Paulino-Perez, said he spoke to his brother at 5 p.m Wednesday, a few hours before he was arrested. His brother told him that Margarita had gone with him willingly, said Silvino Paulino-Perez, 26, through an interpreter and friend Carlos E. Lopez. (He is Arturo Lopez's uncle.)

But his brother said he was scared and was planning to bring Margarita back. "We want to know what's going to happen to Antonio," said Silvino Paulino-Perez. "We're very worried."

His sister, Cecilia Paulino-Perez also was arrested and charged with resisting arrest without violence. Police said that she denied having any brothers when first questioned, and that she did not know Margarita. Eventually she confirmed she had a brother named Antonio and knew Margarita.

Florida Department of Law Enforcement spokesman Larry Long would not say exactly how authorities tracked Margarita and Paulino-Perez to South Carolina, except to say, "our agents worked with a confidential informant who gave us information on the location."

"That led us to that area and we were able to meet up with the suspect at that time and take him into custody and recover Margarita," Long added.

Police said Margarita was physically in good condition, but they were not saying whether she had been mistreated.

"The investigation is still going on," Radzilowski said. "We're not really going into any details because now it's in the hands of the State Attorney's Office and the U.S. Attorney."

Radzilowski said one reason the investigation went well was that Detective John Negron and other officers did a thorough initial investigation which allowed them to sort through numerous false leads that came in to the police department.

"Beating the bushes, we were able to identify the suspect ... which made it so much easier for us," Radzilowski said.

Times staff writer Alex Leary contributed to this report.

[Last modified April 29, 2005, 01:02:18]