Inset: Noel Rodriguez-Alvarez (Everman Police Department). Background: A helicopter view of an excavation at the boy”s former home in Everman, Texas (KDFW).
The multi-year search for a long-missing and presumed dead Texas boy appears to have drawn to its foregone conclusion.
Earlier this week, local police and the FBI began digging up the backyard of the house Noel Rodriguez-Alvarez, a 6-year-old disabled boy from the Fort Worth suburb of Everman, once called home.
On Thursday, authorities announced they had discovered human remains somewhere at the property on Wisteria Lane.
“I want to start by acknowledging the weight of this moment for our community, for those who have followed this case since its beginning, and most importantly for the memory of little Noel Rodriguez-Alvarez,” Everman Police Chief Al Brooks said at a press conference.
The remains are now in the custody of the Tarrant County Medical Examiner, who is performing a “complete forensic examination and working toward an official identification,” the police chief said.
Brooks stressed there is not yet an official identification and that law enforcement “will not get ahead of that process.”
During a question-and-answer session, local media in North Texas tried, in vain, to obtain details about the nature of the remains.
The residence in question has been searched before.
In April 2023, cadaver dogs signaled the presence of human remains directly underneath a recently constructed patio of the home that was being rented by Noel’s mother, Cindy Rodriguez-Singh, 40, who is charged with capital murder of a person under 10 years old.
Everman city manager Craig Spencer, the former police chief who led the investigation into the boy’s disappearance for years, commented on the prior search while answering questions on Thursday.
“We did have cadaver dogs that alerted back there,” he said. “I will not comment on the extent of what occurred with this particular search. But what I will tell you is that each and every search was done professionally, methodically, with the resources we had available at the time.”
Spencer repeatedly declined to answer more specific questions about the nature of the latest search and about what, in particular, led investigators to the area of the yard where searchers were focused. He stressed that certain details and comments might affect “the integrity of the investigation” and efforts to obtain justice for Noel.
The boy disappeared without a trace in the fall of 2022.
Authorities quickly determined he had likely been murdered. His mother was indicted on the murder charge in October 2023 — a little over one year after Noel was last seen alive by extended family.
Since November 2022, various witnesses told law enforcement versions of stories — always sourced to Noel’s mother — purporting to account for the little boy’s whereabouts. Those accounts and concerns put the Singh family on law enforcement radar. But charges were not filed until much later. Then the family left the country.
Law enforcement learned Rodriguez-Singh boarded an international flight with a layover in Turkey, with India as the final destination, just two days before an Amber Alert was issued about Noel’s disappearance. Joining the defendant on that flight were her six other children and current husband, Arshdeep Singh, authorities say.
Several theories — such as human trafficking — supported the notion the boy was still alive. But such avenues of inquiry were soon discarded and replaced by the belief he was killed by his mother.
In August 2025, the FBI announced Singh had been apprehended and charged — but did not say when or where the long-gone defendant was finally arrested. She has widely been presumed to be hiding out somewhere abroad, most likely India, due to the publicly known details of her family’s international departure back in March 2023.
The apprehension came less than one month after Rodriguez-Singh was added to the FBI’s “Ten Most Wanted Fugitives” list — becoming the 537th person to earn that ignominious distinction.
In April of this year, a sealed psychiatric evaluation suggested the defendant is incompetent to stand trial. A judge in Tarrant County then formalized the ruling and sent the defendant to a state medical hospital, Dallas-based Fox affiliate KDFW reported. Under such circumstances, prosecutors typically seek to restore competency. All indications are the state plans to try Rodriguez-Singh.
On Thursday, Tarrant County District Attorney Phil Sorrells said he believes Noel’s mother will eventually stand trial.
“We believe we found evidence that improves our case,” he said in response to a question about the paused prosecution.
“The report further said they believe that in the foreseeable future, she will regain competency,” Sorrels said at another point during the press conference. “So, she will stand trial for this.”
