A distraught father coming back home from work found his 11-year-old daughter had been assaulted and killed inside their flat.
Carmelo Gonzalez returned to his Pasadena, Texas home last Saturday only to discover his daughter Maria’s remains hidden inside as laundry basked under the bed.
Officers responded to a call that the girl was not breathing but attempts to resuscitate her failed and she was declared dead at the scene.
Police Chief Josh Bruegger said detectives exonerated the man after confirming he had “alibi [that] checks out, so he is, at this point, not considered a suspect in this investigation.”
They said the man had left the apartment at 10am to head to work and kept messaging Maria throughout the day.
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At one point, the girl texted that someone had been at their door and knocking but confirmed she was in bed and was not going to let them in.
Gonzalez said he contacted family members living in the same apartment complex to check on his daughter but they reported not seeing or hearing anything.
He returned home five hours after receiving Maria’s message to make the grizzly discovery of her body hidden in a plastic bag inside a laundry basket under the bed.
Gonzalez told Fox26: “Unfortunately, they left her under the bed in a plastic bag, they left my poor daughter.”
He said he could not understand who would hurt his daughter and said he wants to see her killer brought to justice.
Pasadena Police said they have not yet identified a suspect and called for the support of the community, asking locals who could have seen something suspicious in the complex to reach out.
Bruegger said that “we don’t have a suspect at this point,” and that he was not yet sure whether the cameras at the complex were “operational” when Maria was murdered because they had been damaged earlier in the year,
They said detectives are going through a “mountain of digital evidence”.
