Kentucky Couple Jose Gomez-Alvarez, Cheyanne Porter, Arrested After The Search For a Missing 9-year-old Girl Found Stuffed Inside Tote In Storage Locker

The instance ‘Kentucky Couple Jose Gomez-Alvarez, Cheyanne Porter, Arrested After The Search For a Missing 9-year-old Girl Found Stuffed Inside Tote In Storage Locker’ A Kentucky couple has been arrested after a search for a missing child led police to the discovery of human remains.

Kentucky Couple Jose Gomez-Alvarez, Cheyanne Porter, Arrested After The Search For a Missing 9-year-old Girl Found Stuffed Inside Tote In Storage Locker

Jose Gomez-Alvarez and Cheyanne Porter are facing charges of tampering with physical evidence and abuse of a corpse.

Investigators got involved in the missing child case on Sept. 30 after acquaintances of the couple reported that they had not seen one of Gomez-Alvarez’s children for some time.

“There was some concern that the other child hadn’t been seen in a while,” Daviess County Sheriff Barry Smith tells PEOPLE. “They would usually come up with some excuses on why she wasn’t around with them. And that eventually drew a conclusion that maybe there was something wrong with the child, or she was in fact missing.”

Smith said the caller reported that the child was last seen in late 2021 or early 2022 and that Gomez-Alvarez and Porter had not filed a missing person report.

Smith also said investigators opened up a missing person case and put up a Facebook post in an attempt to locate the couple and check on the welfare of the missing girl. He said a number of tips came in.

“After making the social media post, we started getting some tips in,” he said.

One of the tips led investigators to a storage facility in Owensboro where Porter had rented a storage unit, Smith said.

Inside the unit, investigators found a plastic bin with remains inside.

“I’ve been in law enforcement for 28 years, and this is most definitely one that will stick with you as a scene and situation that you just won’t forget,” says Smith.

Smith said authorities believe the remains are Gomez-Alvarez’s 9-year-old daughter but are waiting for the coroner to confirm.

Investigation Into The Death Of The 9-Year-Old Daughter of The Gomez

“We’re still really trying to work through the process to try and figure out the timeline of the death, and the actual location of when the child died, and also still trying to confirm if it is in fact the remains of the child,” he says. “There’s a lot of questions, speculation, so forth we have to sort through to try to find the truth, what’s not the truth, and go from there.”

The couple was taken into custody in Berea, Kentucky. It is unclear if they’ve retained an attorney who can speak on their behalf.