A missing 12-year-old boy has been found dead in Virginia Beach three days after he disappeared while going to a friend’s house.
An AMBER Alert for Juan Sebastian Mejia Acevedo was issued early on Saturday, Jan. 25, according to Virginia State Police.
The Virginia Beach Police Department said Juan was last seen by his parents around 9 a.m. local time in the 200 block of Mica Avenue on Friday, Jan. 24.
Juan’s parents called police around 9 p.m. local time on Friday when he did not come home from a friend’s house, according to police.
The boy’s body was pulled from a pond near the Cambria at Cornerstone apartments off South Independence Boulevard in Virginia Beach around 1 p.m. on Monday, Jan. 27, CBS affiliate WTVR reported.
The pond is reportedly near the address where Juan’s parents last saw him.
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Jenni Acevedo, Juan’s mother, told NBC affiliate WAVY-TV that she allowed her son to go to a friend’s house from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. to do homework but he never arrived.
Juan was last known to be alive around 2 p.m. on Friday when he was seen playing in the snow with friends on a Ring doorbell camera at a condominium near the apartment where Acevedo lived, according to The Virginian-Pilot.
Police said the case was treated as a possible abduction after authorities learned Juan’s parents may have received ransom notes.
Juan’s mom told WAVY-TV that she received the messages while on Facebook Live as she asked others to help find her only child.
“They made me go to a nearby Walmart and asked for money,” Jenni recalled, noting that she paid $500. “I did not give the full amount, just part of it.”
Virginia Beach Police Chief Chief Paul Neudigate said there was no additional communication after the initial payment, according to WTVR and ABC affiliate WVEC.
“One of our theories is that it was possibly a scam perpetuated on the family … but we would be negligent if we did not treat it as an actual threat, an actual kidnapping, until we know otherwise,” Neudigate said, WVEC reported.
Neudigate said it’s too early to say what caused the boy’s death. It is unclear if a homicide investigation will be opened.
