The mother of a 4-year-old boy reported missing earlier this week and then found dead was arrested on Wednesday for allegedly lying to investigators about her son’s whereabouts.
Janet E. Garcia, 27, had blood on her shoes and shirt when Clark County deputies took her into custody, telling the investigators that she’d dropped her son off at a friend’s after he fell out of bed an hit his head.
Garcia appeared in court on Thursday and entered a not guilty plea, everett. She was given a $1,000 bond and a court date of April 16, but remained at the Clark County, Washington, jail on Friday afternoon.
Everett Police said Friday that a body found on Thursday is likely Ariel Garcia, who was last seen Wednesday at about 7 a.m., as CrimeOnline reported. The Snohomish County Medical Examiner’s Office is expected to determine the cause and manner of death next week.
Ariel’s grandmother filed for emergency guardianship on Monday, citing his mother’s substance abuse issues, which made her prone to vanishing for extended periods without warning. The order was granted the day before Ariel disappeared.
According to the Columbian, Clark County Sheriff’s deputies arrested Janet Garcia after responding to a report of an unwanted person at an address in Ridgefield. That person turned out to be Garcia.
Police in Everett had already contacted Clark County about Garcia, according to an affidavit that said she had been staying with a friend, but when the friend came home Wednesday morning, she and her son were gone and there was a large amount of blood on the floor.
When the deputies spoke with Garcia, the affidavit says, she had blood on her shoes and shirt and told them her son had fallen off a bed an hit his head. She said she took him to a hospital in Everett but the wait was too long, so she dropped him off with a friend and took a bus to Ridgefield, leaving her car behind in Everett.
But her car was found at a bar parking lot in Ridgefield just south of where she was found. Security video showed the car pull into the parking lot and woman who appeared to be Garcia get out just after 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday, the affidavit says.
Garcia then agreed to be interviewed at a police precinct, where she reportedly gave conflicting information about her activities that day but stuck to the story about Ariel falling out of bed.
She said that after she dropped her son off at her friend’s house, she deleted the friend’s phone number and her own Facebook account and hopped on a bus in downtown Seattle, heading to Ridgefield. She could not explain how her car got to Ridgefield, but investigators said they saw no evidence anyone else drove it.
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[Featured image: Ariel Garcia/Everett Police Department]
