This girl surely has a long road of difficulty ahead of her, but at least she's found, and apparently safe:
An eight-year-old girl who had been missing since 2018 when she was kidnapped from a Washington shopping mall has been found safe and well in Mexico and returned to the US.
Aranza Maria Ochoa Lopez was abducted by her biological mother on October 25, 2018, in Vancouver, Washington, according to the FBI, who announced her return Wednesday.
Lopez had a supervised visit with her mother, Esmeralda Lopez-Lopez, on the day that she disappeared, the FBI confirmed to CBS News.
Police have not yet revealed who this girl was with when she was found by authorities. If you're thinking "her mother, the one who kidnapped her," that would be reasonable, but actually, as it turns out, wrong:
Her mother was taken into custody in September, 2019 in Puebla, a city in east-central Mexico, as the search for the girl continued.
She pleaded guilty in 2021 to second-degree kidnapping, robbery and first-degree custodial interference, according to local newspaper The Columbian.
The youngster was found in Michoacán in western Mexico; she was brought back to the U.S. last month, where her location is not being disclosed.
