Episode 588: The Disappearance of Delimar Vera

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And I'm Alayna.

And this is morbid.

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This is morbid. Oh, it's morbid, it's morbid. And guess what, we did? Another TikTok.

And it was really funny.

It was a fun one.

We used our girl, Kayle Lowry, we did.

And it was awesome.

You know, name and likeness, or whatever it is.

Yeah, and you guys have been hilarious about it, so thanks for supporting our TikTok journey with my book.

Shouldn't be outside enjoying the sunlight.

Should be in a cave the funniest audio.

What an unhinged thing to say to a human being, truly hilarious.

Hilarious.

I think even Kayle would agree that that's fucking hilarious, but like, Whoa?

It's so-.

How does your brain just say to another person-?

It's so calm. Should be in a cave, should be in a cave, yeah, what?

And I love her reaction because she's just like, What, what the fuck are you talking about?

It's so good, but that TikTok was really fun to film. Yeah, you guys have been amazing about it, so thanks for being so great.

What's your TikTok handle, you bitch?

What is it? is it an? I think it's a mask, I think it's Elena to the max. my everything is Elena to the max, I think.

You gotta let the people know every time, yeah, that's how we're going to drive-.

That's how you drive people.

The new people to your TikToks?

You know, I am a millennial. And we'll be doing more as September 17th approaches, which is the day that the book comes out. The Butcher Game thebutchergame.com. If you need to order something, you could pre-order it.

And, like, more signed copies might be happening, maybe right?

Who knows?

You never know, you never know. The world is an oyster, and it's yours.

And it's my oyster.

Yeah, no, theirs.

No, well, it's all of ours.

Yeah, everybody's oyster.

We can all have a part of the oyster.

Unless you have a shellfish allergy.

I actually don't like shellfish, so it's my like meatball sub, I would say.

I have to tell you something, I told you I was never going to eat oysters again, I ate them.

Vibrio.

I ate them, but I'm only eating them in places where, like, I feel like the water is super fresh. It's a vibe.

Vibrio, it's also a vibe.

No, vibrio is actually not a vibe, it's a vibe.

It's some kind of vibe.

Vibrio is a is a is a dang dark place.

Flame with fire, my friend, I know, but Yolo, you know, here we are. but Yolo.

As the kids would say.

I don't think they say that anyway. I almost said, Yolo, yolo, I accidentally said, Yolo, yolo.

Yolo.

Here we are.

I don't know, you know, I have an interesting case today to tell you all about. Do you I do?

Totally different, but it's not.

It's sort of it's like in a different wheelhouse, okay, but it's still our wheelhouse, I feel.

All right.

It's a kidnapping, I'd like to warn you at the top of the show.

Okay.

So it's a little bit intense.

Okay.

But I'm going to also tell you, it has a happy ending.

Oh, good, okay.

I'll take it and nobody dies, there's no murder. Look at that, yeah.

That is different, so here we are, it is different. Wheelhouse.

All right, so should we dive in?

Let's dive in.

It's been a long time.

I know since we did that.

And it just came to me, it did all right. So we're going to be talking about the disappearance of Delamar Vera. Delamar Vera was born December 5th, 1997..

Here we go and we're off.

¿Excitable.

¿Excitable.

Luce was beyond excited about the arrival of her baby daughter, but she always maintained her then-husband Pedro hadn't been super stoked about the prospect of having children. He was like, Yeah, woo-hoo, but like, according to her, not super excited.

That's not great.

In fact, according to her, when the baby was born, Pedro actually refused to sign the birth certificate, which she pointed to as evidence that he, quote, did not want the child.

I think that's pretty glaring evidence, I would say.

Yeah, I'm like, I don't love that.

That's really sad.

I know. But a little more than a week later, on December 15th, Luce was home with Pedro, their new baby Delamar, which I think is such a pretty name. And their two sons, who at that time were four and five. And around 7 p...m. there was a knock on the door, and Luce answered it. To find a woman who she'd never met before, standing on her doorstep. The woman, Carolyn Carrera, was actually Pedro's cousin by marriage. She was from New Jersey, and she said she was there hoping that Pedro might take a look at her car.

Okay.

Random. Yeah, unexpected.

That's why I don't answer the door.

Oh, I never answer the door.

No, I literally never answer the door.

Even when it's people I'm expecting, I send Drew.

He's like, Nope.

Can you get the door, please?

Oh, yeah, I don't even answer the door, then. Yeah, nope, nope.

But Pedro agreed to take a look at the car. But before he did, he said he needed to run some errands and go grocery shopping. So while he was out, the two women remained at the house. Just kind of making small talk, because, remember, they don't know each other, so it's like a pretty awkward situation. But she's kind of family, like she's family, so she loses trying to, like, be a good entertainer.

I'd be like, sorry.

But she said later on she would describe it as an uncomfortable conversation.

Yeah, yeah, I can imagine.

And also having just given birth a little over a week earlier, I don't think you'd really want to be entertaining by yourself.

No, you don't.

But because she had just given birth only a week earlier, or, like, a little more than a week earlier, the subject of a baby came up naturally. And this woman, Carolyn, mentioned that she and her boyfriend, Andrea Moore, had also just recently had a baby, she said, Same sister.

Wow.

Now, as the women were chatting downstairs, Lou suddenly heard a loud bang upstairs that sounded like an explosion and the baby sleeping upstairs.

What the fuck?

So she is all obviously terrified, and she runs upstairs and goes into Delamar's room. But by the time she reached the room, a small fire had broken out and the room was beginning to fill with smoke. Holy shit now. Despite the large amount of smoke now and the fumes just rapidly filling the room, Luz was able to get to the crib. She was completely determined to get there, yeah.

What the fuck?

She was gone.

In her own room.

Yep, she had just been sleeping in her room and then she heard a loud bang and the baby was gone by the time she got to the crib.

That's everyone's worst nightmare.

And it's also just like, How did this happen? She was upstairs and I've been downstairs this whole time. Yeah, like, where's the baby? So a few seconds later, the smoke had become unbearable and Luz was forced to get out of the room.

What the fuck?

No, she also noticed that the window in the room was open, and she knew that there was no way she would have done that herself. No, just one having the baby in the room by herself. She wasn't going to open the window. But also it was a cold night, so it just wouldn't have been something that she'd do, so this was shocking.

She has a four and five-year-old baby.

So they were forced outside, and this is heartbreaking. Neighbors just could hear her screaming My baby, my baby, oh God, over and over again.

Baby, oh man.

Frazon remembered the neighbors were outside yelling, There's a baby in there, there's a baby. And Luce also reported to the firefighters that she had gone to her daughter's room when the fire first broke out. But that she had found no baby in the crib where she had expected her baby, Delamar to be.

That's horrifying.

Now there's no documentation of how firefighters responded to the claims, but it's pretty clear from their later statements that they didn't believe Luce at the time.

Why the fuck would she say that?

I don't really know. Within about 10 minutes, firefighters had things under control, luckily, and the fire was extinguished. But the small row house had been completely gutted and there was no sign of little Delamar now. Just then, Pedro returned to find the house destroyed, his wife being packed into an ambulance, and he found out that his daughter was consumed by the fire. That's what firefighters told him.

Holy shit.

Yeah. Delamar ended up being declared dead at the scene, and fire officials explained to Pedro that they found no body because her remains were completely destroyed by the flames. Now, just up front, that is not what happened, so don't think for a second that that's what happened. But that's what this family was told. Holy shit. But they never believed it.

Wow.

So the next day, fire captain Henry Dolberry told the press the fire was caused by a home-rigged extension cord connected to a space heater, which must have thrown a spark at some point and started the fire.

Oh man.

Neighbor Gloria Mojica said It's a shame because they were just trying to find a way to keep themselves warm.

Yeah.

Luce was discharged from Temple University Hospital just one day after the fire. And she learned that not only were there no remains to bury, but also that, as a result of there not being a body, the medical examiner actually couldn't issue a death certificate or even legally declare Delamar dead.

Holy shit.

So firefighters, first responders said, declare their dead at the scene, but they couldn't legally do that like firefighters could. But they couldn't have it on record.

Like official record.

Exactly, and if the parents wanted or needed that formality, they were going to have to go and petition.

A court to get their child declared legally dead.

Yeah, exactly.

When they don't know that, for sure, exactly.

Wow, so. The family was understandably devastated, but they didn't really have a lot of choice but to move on and try to make things the best they could for their two living children. So they moved to a new house and in 1999, Luce gave birth to a fourth child, a boy that they named Samuel. They felt happy about adding to their family, obviously, but the loss of a child took a really heavy toll on them, of course.

That's so common it is when you lose a child.

When you lose a child, and just like grief in general, that can tear people apart. And by that time, they really just agreed on very little, and their communication was just, it had gotten really bad. But they did agree on one thing. They both believed that Delamar was still alive in 2004, Luce said. I always knew that my daughter did not die in that fire.

And it's like you can see how, like, the whole thing changed. His perspective on, like, being a father with this child, you know what I mean, and like, you can tell, he immediately was like, That's my baby and my baby's alive.

It's like a very cliche thing to say, but you don't know what you have till it's gone. Yeah, you know.

It's like, cause, obviously he was like, that's my child, and they were correct. It sounds like, so.

Definitely now. Pager wasn't just convinced that his daughter was alive, but he was also determined to find her wherever she had gone. Hell yeah, Pager, I know.

Let's go.

Mojica said he would tell me he was pursuing it, though what exactly that meant, how he was pursuing it remains unclear.

But, you know what, he had intentions, too, yeah.

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Holy shit.

And she's just at a family party.

And at a family party.

That feeling became even stronger when she realized that the girl's mother was Carolyn. Correa. I think it's Correa.

I didn't trust this lady the second you said, she showed up at the door.

She just showed up at the door from New Jersey randomly and was like, Hey, my brakes are.

Fucked up. I didn't want to say it for fear that, like she was an innocent bystander here. So I was keeping it inside. But I was like, I don't know about this girl.

Imagine, like, don't you imagine this? But I will not imagine your child goes missing from your home while a weird stranger is there. And then you go to a family party and you see what you know is your child, or, like, very, very strongly believe, is your child? And the lady who you had a weird feeling about already is claiming to be the mother, or is the lady that took this child to the party like you dealt? Or Luz must have felt like she was in an alternate fucking universe.

And the feeling of like helplessness at first must have been unreal, because it's like, What do I do?

When everyone's going to think, I sound cuckoo, nuts, bananas.

And it's like, if you know that's your child, you're like, Well, I'm going to burn the. I'm going to like, scorch the earth to get this child back. So like, I guess let's fucking go, like that would be my, I'd be like, let's go.

Let's go.

Let's fucking go like I'm going to burn the whole place down, I would like I'm getting that kid back.

Well, don't you worry, Luz is the baddest bitch in the game.

I knew it about Luz.

So Carolyn introduced this girl as Aaliyah, was like, This is my daughter Aaliyah, but Luz just couldn't shake the feeling that not Aaliyah, this was her daughter Delamar. And she was like, she started putting two and two together, and she's like, I don't know how, but somehow, Carolyn kidnapped my baby on the night of the fire.

Like, I just know it in my heart. She kept her distracted downstairs.

She later told a reporter Those dimples were all the DNA I needed to be certain, cause she had these cute little dimples.

That is some mama shit. She had that child for, like, a little over a week.

Literally a little over a week.

Like, that's like, like, luckily, like, luckily, many of us do not have to worry about, like, what? How you would be able to identify your child older when not seeing them for their entire life? But hearing this, you're just like, damn, like that parent, like love and knowledge for your like, who your child is, that's unbelievable.

It's a force, it's a force to be reckoned with.

You knew this infant newborn, and then you see them years later and you're like, that's my kid.

And like, let's be real, most newborns look alike, like newborns all look pretty similar.

That's unbelievable. Yeah, that's really unbelievable.

This family is iconic.

Yeah, they're incredible.

So, according to Pedro's cousin, Jose Vera, this was actually not the first time either Pedro or Luz had seen Aaliyah. And while they weren't exactly close with Carolyn, they were still related and had some contact with her over the years. But not much. But Jose Vera said they agreed the child looked like them, and Pedro always thought it was his daughter, but nothing ever happened till now. Oh, damn so. He claimed that, although, although Pedro had seen the girl in person at family functions, Luz had only ever seen her in photographs before this family function. Where she's like, That's my daughter.

That's my child.

And she really didn't have a lot of contact with the family since ending her relationship with Pedro in 2002.

But now I'm in front of her, I'm in her presence, I know it.

And she actually told the host of the party that she believed Aliyah was Delamar. But given the unbelievable nature of the claim, the host just kind of dismissed what she was saying and was like, No, no, no, that's Carolyn's daughter. Like, you must be mistaken, and probably felt bad, probably was like.

Yeah, like that, I have to tell you like, I'm sorry, no, that's someone else's daughter, right, right?

But Luz's own brother even doubted what she was saying and said We thought she was just traumatized by the fire.

Which, like, you can understand that, yeah, cause it's like that would be traumatizing. I can't even fathom the amount of trauma she would have, absolutely.

Or maybe not.

Or maybe not.

So later that afternoon, Luz was like, Okay, you guys can all think I'm cuckoo nuts, bananas, but I'm not, and I'm going to prove it to all of you.

She's like, Nope.

So she approached the girl, the little girl, and just made small talk with her. And then, right before Aaliyah was about to run off, Luz told her, Oh, you have some gum in your hair, like, let me help you with that. And while she removed the gum, or like, while she pretended to remove the gum. She used it as an opportunity to get a hair sample that she could take to the police for DNA testing. Luz is a fucking icon.

Luz I want to like shake Luz's hand.

I want to high five her.

Holy shit Luz, that is genius level.

She's so nonchalant about it, too, she told reporters later. Because of TV, I knew they needed hair for the DNA.

Oh, bitch, like Luz is top notch. She's like, I just watched TV, I learned some shit. That's elite.

Unbelievable.

Truly unbelievable, because your first instinct might be to, just like, you know, you're like, again, you're traumatized, you're desperate to find your child. Yeah, you would want to run up to her and just be like, you're my baby.

That's the thing. She's six years old.

She's been raised for six years by Carolyn. You can't scare her, you can't make her question her whole upbringing, you don't know what kind of life she's had, you don't know anything about that.

Mama shit.

Well done, Luce.

So a few days after the party, Luce brought the Harris to her local Philadelphia police precinct to ask for help. And they redirected her to a lab where she could actually get the DNA testing done. Hell yeah, according to the official story. Remember, Delamar Vera had died in a tragic fire and police never believed she was kidnapped? So there was actually little they could have done to help her at the time.

I'm sure.

So Luce had hoped to get the DNA test done to prove that Aaliyah was her daughter. With limited English language skills, no information about how to access laboratory testing and, of course, little financial resources, that kind of thing is so expensive.

Yeah.

The chances that she would get answers were pretty slim. But after hearing her story, though, a neighbor suggested that Luce seek help from Representative Angel Cruz, who represented the largely Latino Philadelphia neighborhood that Luce was living in at the time. Cruz said I must admit when Luce first came to me with this story, I had trouble believing her.

I mean, it's an incredible story.

It is, but something in the story struck him as being true, so he agreed to speak with law enforcement on her behalf and explain what she had told him. He was like, I don't know, but I'll try, Hell yeah, Cruz now. When the fire first broke out in Pedro and Luce's home in 1997, her instinct was to run to the daughter's room and save her.

I was wondering, like, because I'm like, what is this loud bang? Like, what happened here?

Exactly, and you could assume, like, Oh, that was the space heater exploding.

Absolutely.

I can see that, which you understand, of course. Any claims Luce and Pedro made after the fire were just dismissed as those of grieving parents struggling to accept what had happened.

Yeah, just not being willing to.

And also, when Luce initially took the lock of hair to the police, she brought it to the front desk of the precinct because how would she know to bring it there?

I wouldn't know what to do with it, yeah.

But the receiving officer had no prior knowledge of the case. And there wasn't any kind of translator there to help with the barrier, the language barrier.

Oh man.

So she wasn't able to really convey how important this was.

Yeah, this was huge.

What the background here was?

Yeah, that's so frustrating.

Yeah, it is so. To Angel Cruz, who spoke fluent Spanish, the story, like we said, was equally unbelievable. And his instinct, though, was to respond exactly how law enforcement agents had over the years. But the fact that Luce had never wavered in her belief, and she was so thoroughly convinced that the girl was her daughter, seemed good enough. A reason to him to at least follow up.

Another goodie.

I know this is full. That's what I told you, it started off, and you're like, What the fuck are you about to tell me?

Yeah, I'm like, what is going on?

But I'm like, No, it's a good story. Yeah, you're like, I promise you, I promise you guys.

This just keeps going up and up and up. It does, and it will, yeah.

So, given the details of the crime and the age of the alleged victim, the case was handed over to Lt. Michael Boyle of Philadelphia's Special Victims Unit. An episode of SVU, if you will. In late February, detectives and agents from child protective services went to Carolyn's home in New Jersey and explained the situation. Now, given that so much depended on the outcome of the DNA tests, Aaliyah was actually removed from the home and temporarily placed in a foster care while investigators tried to untangle the details of the case. Oh man.

Yeah, and she has no idea what's going on, and she's a little girl.

She's probably like, What is going on?

Yeah, and again, this is all because somebody stole her.

Mm-hmm.

And it's like Luce is just trying to get her back. And obviously they have to go through the steps, the proper steps. They can't just rip her out of a home and be like, Well, she's yours now.

You know what I mean?

Like, I understand that, like, that's necessary. But like, man, this kid didn't ask for any of this, and poor Luce and Pedro didn't ask for any of this.

Carolyn, like, just victimized everybody in this family.

She victimized that child.

Yeah, exactly, just to get something she wanted, yeah.

Oh, wow.

In fact, other family members and her own boyfriend at the time remembered her being pregnant and coming home with a baby at the end of December. Despite the number of times that Pager had voiced his suspicions, nobody ever thought to question Carolyn and her boyfriend's claims. Because why would you ever be like? ...?

What would make you do it? You know, that's the thing, that's the thing.

Now, after all, while newborn babies do get kidnapped.

A lot of people staged a wild coup to steal your newborn.

And not only that, I'm talking about their own family, few people would want to believe their own relatives capable of this.

No, can you imagine thinking of that? No, like in your own family, no that somebody in your own family stole another person's baby in your own family.

Absolutely not.

Out of their crib after starting a fire in their house.

After seeing the results, it was compelling enough that at least a few members of law enforcement were starting to really take this seriously.

Hell yeah, let's go, everybody.

At first everybody's like, Yeah, we'll follow up, but like, I don't know.

It was a case of let's fucking go, and now it's like, let's fucking go, exactly.

So in late February, the results of the DNA test conducted on Aaliyah's hair came back and provided vital answers.

Fuck Carolyn. Yeah, fuck Carolyn.

Well.

What the fuck?

With the results in hand, Lieutenant Boyle and his partner returned to Carolyn's home in New Jersey to confront her. But by the time they got there, she had already fled, leaving her three other young children behind.

Oh, it's on site with Carolyn.

On site.

Like, Fuck you Carolyn, what an asshole.

That's the thing, it's like, she's just out for her and hers.

You're evil.

Not even hers.

You stole someone's newborn, you fucking asshole, and then you abandon your three other children to flee law enforcement after you got caught.

Fuck you, it's fucked to steal any newborn, like, don't keep it that weird to steal a newborn child from your family, it's what.

But I hope we see something for Carolyn at the end of this.

Well, investigators, now that she was on the run, theorized that, certain she'd been found out and would be arrested, she chose to become a fugitive rather than face the consequences.

Oh, you mean coward?

Yes, exactly, because I mean, everything more or less confirmed her guilt in the eyes of detectives.

DNA just proved it you stole a baby.

So, in a statement to the press, a law enforcement official stated their belief that. On the night of December 15th, 1997, Carolyn started the fire and kidnapped Delamar, whom she passed off as her own daughter. Wow, and when they realized that she had fled? Multiple arrest warrants were issued for charges including arson, kidnapping and concealing the whereabouts of a child. So she was facing, like, serious, serious charges here, yeah.

But Arson?

Arson and concealing the whereabouts of a child. Yeah, like, did you not think about this?

Yeah, she did, I don't know. Yeah, she didn't care.

Despite the circumstances, though, Luz couldn't help but feel joy that her daughter wasn't only alive, but would also be reunited with her in the days to come.

Yeah.

Boyle told reporters she sat there and shook and cried, and kept saying, Thank you, thank you, thank you.

But this is going to be tough, absolutely. This kid is six years old.

That's the thing on the other, not-so-bright side of things. This was just the beginning of a slow and, like you said, very difficult process facing everybody involved. Most importantly, Aliyah, or really Delamar, had only ever known Carolyn to be her mother, like we've said.

You can't even imagine a grown adult finding that out.

No.

A teenager finding that out.

How do you explain that to a six-year-old like without creating like? First of all, creating so many new fears?

Yeah, that they were kidnapped out of their crib.

Disillusioning their entire world like that, just that's a glass shatter on your entire world.

And now you have to reform that bond with that child, like, you're going to have a natural something's there, because obviously you knew that was your child. Like, your bond is strong, it's in there.

But she's like, she's probably going to miss Carolyn and feel kind of weird about it. But there's so many layers that you could point out here.

I just feel so bad for.

And also, like, that's a pretty big thing of Luce and Pedro to do. To be like, you know what? We'll keep your name Aaliyah, like your kidnapper named you that, but that's all you know.

And we're not going to change your name. Yeah, that's huge. I wouldn't even change like a puppy's name, no?

Right?

And also it's like, I named you something? Yeah, you know what I mean? like, I named you Delamar, like that was the name I chose for you.

It's almost like.

And now I can't call you that.

It's like a different thing to grieve. Yeah, like, luckily your child is still alive and healthy and you get to have her back.

But you're grieving that identity that you created for them when they were born. So that's a lot on everybody, yeah.

And the other thing was further complicating matters which were already insanely complicated, like we're pointing out now. Luce spoke very little English, and Aaliyah spoke no Spanish. Oh so their ability to communicate with each other.

So Carolyn did all this and also took her out of her culture and didn't teach her the language that she would have been taught.

Yep.

Wow, yep, wow, Carolyn.

Wow.

Good as you should.

The arrest was welcome news to Luce and her family and Pedro, she told a reporter. If she was so evil then and started a fire, she could do that now with the kids inside.

Yes, absolutely.

That's the other thing.

She could have killed her other two children with that fire.

Absolutely.

And she had no fucking.

Now, detectives in Philadelphia were equally pleased with Carolyn's surrender, with Captain John Darby saying. We are pleased that this phase of a complex, protracted and emotionally charged investigation has been completed, with the subject's arrest in this short time, me too, same now. While the arrest appeared to be the beginning of the end of the police involvement in the case, it also raised just as many questions as it answered.

Wow.

In fact, in early January 1998, a few weeks after the fire. She went to the police station in New Jersey in Willingboro and reported that she had given birth at home. A bizarre incident they now believe was intended to cover her trial.

In the first place.

So what do you make of this?

Yeah, like, What, hello, what's going on here?

Now, when it came to Aaliyah, there was some tension between the two of them, but for the most part, everybody remembered that. Carolyn doted on the girl, Evelyn Vera said she treated that little girl better than her three other kids.

That's fucked up, that's also fucked up. I'm glad you treated her well.

But I'm sorry for those other three children. Aaliyah was enrolled in private school, and although she was just six years old, she had already begun a modeling career, appearing in television and print ads. Which also you're just flaunting her, you know what it like?

There's so many layers there that I'm.

Like the psychology. But in this I'm not saying anything about, like kids modeling, I'm saying, in this specific case, you kidnapped this child.

And it's like, that's definitely you just living through this child and wanting to get the like pats on the back for like, look at my pretty little girl in a modeling ad.

And just like dangling her in front of the people who are like, I'm pretty sure that's my kid. Yeah, like, that's the that's the aspect that I'm looking at, like, what the fuck?

When they said she's evil, they are 100 correct, This woman is evil.

Like, that's diabolical, no? What made the story even stranger was that there were many members of the Vera family who not only knew of Pedro and Luz's belief that their daughter was still alive. But several of them, like a lot of people, didn't believe it, but several family members did believe.

They were like, That's crazy.

And there was language barriers.

There was so many things.

Doesn't seem like it was like top of the to-do list for the police at the time.

No, it didn't seem that way.

Until Luz came in there with the hair, Yeah, my girl, Luz.

And then Cruz was like, I'll take care of this.

Exactly now. Even Carolyn's boyfriend at the time was actually suspicious of her story. In 1999, he confronted Carolyn about his suspicions and demanded to take a paternity test to prove whether the child was his or not. And at that point, she broke up with him and never had any contact with him after that.

You wish that?

And honestly, he might have. I didn't come across that, but, like, Pedro and Luz had gone to the police.

With suspicions, and honestly, if that guy did, too.

Because also you probably like, if you're having those suspicions and then she breaks up with you all of a sudden, that pretty much confirms it. But then you must sit there with your own thoughts and say, No, I'm insane, like, there's no way.

And I'm claiming this kid is not mine, like, that's why am I thinking that?

Yeah, there's a lot of layers to that, a lot of guilt, right? And having truly believed Carolyn to have been pregnant at the time.

Oh, I can't imagine.

Because he thought she had been pregnant with his baby.

And then she's got this child and he's like, I don't think this is our child. And she's like, Well, fuck you and just breaks up with him and cuts off contact.

It's like.

Because now he's probably thinking, like, is that my child? And I can't see them now? Like, what the fuck?

And now I'm feeling some layer of guilt.

But now I still don't believe that's my kid, like, what happened to my child?

And I don't know, I don't know.

Scammers are best known for living the high life until they're forced to trade it all in for handcuffs and an orange jumpsuit once they're finally caught. I'm Sachi Cole and I'm Sarah Hagee. And we're the host of Scamfluencers, a weekly podcast from Wondery that takes you along the twists and turns of some of the most infamous scams of all time.

After all.

This actually wasn't the first time Carolyn had been in trouble with the law.

I'm shocked.

Or the first time she'd made up a wild story to explain away someone's suspicions. In 1996, she had to go to court because she'd actually been arrested and charged with starting a fire at a New Jersey medical office where she'd been working as a billing clerk. According to police, Carolyn had been stealing business checks and cashing them. But when she believed her boss had caught on to what she was doing, she, quote, tried to destroy evidence by setting fire to the office.

Wow, Carolyn.

Once an arsonist, always an arsonist.

Yeah.

Also, there were people still inside the building at the time she set the fire.

Oh, she doesn't care about human life, like she doesn't care, no, as long as she's getting what she wants out of it, like, it's pure luck that she hasn't.

Carolyn's out for Carolyn and Carolyn only.

Yeah, she doesn't give a shit.

But because there was people in the building at the time, she set the fire.

I'm sorry if someone tries to burn down a building with people inside of it, that's attempted murder.

Also, let me tell you if I was in that motherfucking office at the time that she had set it ablaze, and I found out that she got probation.

And community service.

I would be through the fucking roof, I'd be calling everybody.

That seems really wild to me.

There's more, that's what this story should be titled, But wait, there's more. It was also not the only time Carolyn had claimed to be pregnant when she wasn't.

Oh, you don't say.

In 2000, while working at a drugstore, she told multiple co-workers that she was pregnant, even though she never showed any physical signs of being pregnant. That fall, she took maternity leave, and when she returned to work and trigger warning, she says something terrible.

I don't even know how to respond to that.

Her boss said It was kind of gruesome, I really didn't know what to say to her.

She didn't have a stillborn. Carolyn is one of the grossest people I've heard of. She's gross, unreal. That's unbelievable.

This case, obviously, whenever a child that is presumed to have been missing for many, many years is recovered. It's remarkable, but, in this case, the most unbelievable part of it.

That baby had a mother that you were sitting talking to downstairs. It filled your emptiness, though, to steal her newborn. Yeah, totally yeah, definitely okay, that makes sense.

Also, that just doesn't make any sense whatsoever. It's fine. If her story seemed entirely implausible, it only got stranger from there. She also claimed that Luce had not only known the truth about her daughter all along.

Here's the thing, too.

No, the kid.

You don't refer to your kid as the kid.

Why didn't he get the kid?

I've never referred to my kid, why didn't you go get the kid over there?

It's like, what?

No, I don't believe shit all that you're saying.

Like we said, Carolyn's out for Carolyn, yeah. While authorities never believed that Pedro Rivera was involved in his daughter's kidnapping.

That's horrifying, that's what I'm wondering. She was downstairs, distracting Luz. Somebody came in that room and stole that child for her. She was involved, obviously, but she didn't do the act herself.

Right?

I'm sure somebody else was involved in that. What the fuck was that?

Isn't that interesting? The person is only referred to as an unnamed conspirator because it's like.

How can you break free and steal a newborn out of a window?

Also, they had to have a really compelling story to be unnamed in all of this.

No, that's wild.

Yeah, it's weird. But in 2005, Pedro's lawyer, Mike Luber, told reporters This is a woman who is obviously a pathological liar. She has significant mental problems, Two of the psychiatrists have said. She is mentally imbalanced and she obviously will say anything.

That's so weird.

There's not enough information about the case to point fingers. Obviously, I'm not going to point fingers.

You're not going to speculate.

I wish I could speculate on my own.

There's not enough.

There's just not enough. For her part, Carolyn has always stuck to her story and maintained her innocence.

That's Carolyn who's saying.

It's unfair. I raised her instead of saying I want my child back, saying this woman kidnapped my kid because she's saying. They should have said I want my kid back because I gave my kid to you voluntarily, and now I want it back, wow.

This kid, yeah.

Instead, she believes, once Pedro learned that she had lost her baby in December of 1997, he decided to hand his own child over to her. I don't know about that. According to the Philadelphia Daily News, her medical records actually show no sign of her having been pregnant at the time or giving birth to a stillborn baby, as she claims. But she has stuck to that story.

Wow.

So, like, I don't know a lot about that surgery, I don't know if it's reversible, but I know. Even when people do try to get like their tubes untied, it depletes your chances of getting pregnant.

It can be reversed by another operation. Only about 50 to 80 of women become pregnant after having their fallopian tubes reattached.

That's what I figured, like, I know some, like surgeries like that, claim to be reversible.

It's a lower chance.

It's a much lower chance, so who's to say?

Yeah.

But in her version of events, Carolyn went to the house that day to give Pedro a ride to a friend's house to buy drugs. She said, meanwhile, like, they were like, No, she showed up asking.

Yeah.

She alleged All the way back to the house, he said, It's my fault. I cut the wires in the heater and did something. And when they got near the house, she claims, he asked her to drop him.

What?

So he got the baby out of the fire.

I'm like, what?

That doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

No.

The fire started, so you drove him to his friend's house. To quote unquote, Buy drugs. Then you went back to Luz's house and then the fire happened. And nobody knew where the baby was, and the baby was already missing from her crib. And then you left to go get Pedro.

That's the weirdest story I've ever heard.

What, anyway? She continued I took her home, laid down next to her and played with her. From then on, she was mine. And no one questioned it, except multiple people for six entire years.

What the fuck?

No one questioned it, baby, what the fuck are you talking about? It's documented that people have questioned it.

Yeah, literally documented.

As the trial neared, Carolyn agreed to plead no contest to the charges. And in late September 2005, she was sentenced to nine to 30 years in prison for the abduction. After the sentence was passed, she addressed the court, saying I truly believe I need counseling. Your honor, I want to apologize to the family and the court for all of this confusion.

All of this confusion.

I need counseling. 10 out of 10 agree.

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