Marlen Ochoa-Lopez was 19 years old and the mother of another child, three years old. Chicago police said Thursday at a press conference the details of this macabre story and explained how it solved the case.
– Sofia Santana
Marlen Ochoa-Lopez, 19, was nine months pregnant when she disappeared in April in Chicago. His body was found on Tuesday, a corpse, with signs of strangulation. The baby was taken from the womb by force. Chicago police said Thursday the details of this grisly story and explained how it resolved the case.
The pregnant girl, who was already the mother of a three-year-old, disappeared after an exchange of messages on a group of Facebook mothers. Marlen, who was in high school, was unemployed and therefore willing to accept or exchange baby products.
In this group of mothers, a woman stated that she had baby clothes and other items to offer and asked her to get in touch with you by private message.
Marlen was last seen on April 23, leaving her high school. For weeks the family and the police had no idea what had happened to him. They made appeals, organized searches, but without success.
It is now known that, the same day the girl disappeared, Chicago firefighters received an emergency call from a woman who claimed that her newborn baby needed help.
When the firemen arrived the place was blue. The newborn was taken to the hospital along with the woman who claimed to be his mother, where he remains in critical condition.
The authorities did not immediately associate this emergency call with Marlen’s disappearance.
On May 7, however, everything changed in the investigation of this case: a friend of Marlen revealed to the detectives the exchange of messages on Facebook between the young woman and a woman named Clarisa Figueroa.
The police went to Clarisa’s house and spoke to her 24-year-old daughter, Desiree. First, Desiree told detectives that her mother was in the hospital because of her leg problems, but later she said that after all, her mother had recently given birth. An ill-told story, which, first of all, intrigued the investigators.
She told a very strange story. Agents knew where it was headed, “Brendan Deenihan, chief of the detectives involved in the case, told a news conference on Thursday.
Meanwhile, agents found Marlen’s car near the Figueroa family home. And in parallel, they discovered that Clarissa had started a fund-raising for her baby’s funeral that said she was dying.
Interviewed by the police at the hospital, Clarisa stated that she had met her pregnant yes, but before the day that she had disappeared. A version that did not dispel the suspicions of the police, on the contrary.
The detectives then collected DNA samples from Clarissa, the baby she claimed to be her own, and Yilvan Lopez, Marlen’s husband. And it was through these samples of genetic material that the police concluded that the baby was, after all, the son of Marlen and Yiovanni.
On Tuesday, with a warrant, police searched the Figueroa family home and found cleaning and blood products in some rooms of the house.
Marlen’s body was discovered in a dustbin, behind the house, with signs of strangulation.
Desiree has already confessed to the agents that she helped her mother strangle the pregnant girl.
The two women were charged with a first degree murder and aggravated bodily injury in a child under the age of 13. Clarice’s boyfriend, Piotr Bobak, was also charged with two crimes: hiding a person’s death and hiding a murder death.
Authorities believe Clarissa, 46, wanted to re-educate a child. A son, in his 20s, had died two years ago of natural causes.
Marlen’s father, Arnulgo Ochoa, told reporters that the family wants justice for the girl. The husband, Yiovanni, still expects a “miracle” to save the baby.
We ask God to give us our child because it is a blessing that our wife left us, ” said Yiovanni, excited.
