Authorities Ask Help in Finding 3-Year-Old West Covina Girl

Authorities are appealing for help after conducting an intensive search for a 3-year-old girl, who according to her 33-year-old stepsister vanished Wednesday night from a car in a Target store parking lot in Industry.

Sheriff’s Sgt. Richard James said investigators were conducting a polygraph test of Elvira Moreno Valencia, the stepsister of missing Perla Guadelupe Valencia. “We’re investigating all the possibilities,” he said.

The stepsister told deputies she left Perla, who lives in West Covina, and her 2-year-old brother asleep in a car parked at the Target store on 17700 block of Colima Road just before 9 p.m. while she retrieved her purse from the vehicle’s trunk.

When she came back to the front of the car about a minute later, she said, she noticed that Perla was missing, Deputy Brian Jones said.

A five-hour search Wednesday involving a sheriff’s helicopter, four dogs and several deputies failed to locate the girl.

Perla is 3 feet, 6 inches tall, weighs 26 pounds, and has brown eyes and shoulder-length black hair. She was last seen wearing a pink-and-white striped shirt and blue pants. Anyone with information on the girl is urged to contact Sheriff’s Lt. Don Handley at (818) 330-3322.