Father, Aunt to Be Arraigned in Boy’s Death

Five-year-old Ernesto Barrera was buried as he lived, out of public view and nearly forgotten.

As sheriff’s investigators struggled to untangle the unusual home life of the boy buried by his older twin brothers in a shallow grave at the edge of Angeles National Forest, they accused his father, Marco Barragon, 34, of beating his son to death.

Barragon, an immigrant, fathered at least 10 children by two sisters. At times, neighbors said, Barragon, the women and children would work long days as vendedores, pushing carts filled with ears of corn through immigrant neighborhoods in the eastern San Fernando Valley.

Now, one of those sisters, Juana Barrera, 28, stands accused with Barragon in the slaying of Ernesto, her nephew. The two will be arraigned today.

And the other sister, Petra Barrera, 35, was left stunned and saddened Tuesday by her child’s death, whose details were disclosed to her through a television news broadcast.

“I came here for a better life, but it ended up worse,” Petra Barrera said in Spanish as she took shelter in a neighbor’s house across the street from the tiny one-room apartment that Barragon rented for her under an assumed name. Empty of furniture but for a small mattress pad, a television set and a soiled carpet, the apartment sits near a huge power line in a low-rent district that is home to many recent immigrants from Mexico.

Sheriff’s investigators and social workers on Tuesday were still trying to determine exactly what led to Ernesto’s burial off Lopez Canyon Road on Sunday, but one thing seemed clear: The immigrants largely escaped official notice and details of their lives--even ones as simple as the spellings of their names--were hard to pin down.

The family, which could be composed of as many as 13 children ranging in age from 2 weeks to 16 years, lived in two households about two miles apart. Petra Barrera, whose name was also given as Pietra de Barrera, lived with seven children in her small apartment on Mineola Street in Arleta. Her sister Juana, whose name was originally released as Guana, lived with six others in a converted garage on Desmond Avenue in Pacoima.

Although the two women’s children went back and forth between addresses, it was unclear what the relationship was between the two sisters. Petra described herself as Marco Barragon’s wife and said her sister was Barragon’s lover.

It was also unclear whether the owner of the Desmond Avenue home had received a permit to convert the garage, which was filled with dirty dishes, a few mattresses and scattered toys. However, there was no record of complaints filed at either address, according to Department of Building and Safety officials.

Sheriff’s officials said that Barragon--who used at least one alias, Marco Esquivel--had been previously arrested on suspicion of spousal abuse. Yet no court records could be found to corroborate the reported arrests.

Similarly, county social workers said they had no record of any child-abuse complaints filed at either address--yet Ernesto’s body bore bruises, sheriff’s deputies said Tuesday. They had to reach back to welfare records filed five years ago to find any record of the family, said Schuyler Sprowles, spokesman for the Department of Children and Family Services.

Nine of the children are now in protective custody, Sprowles said. Yet a 16-year-old boy, Edilberto, has run away from home to find a better life, Petra said Tuesday. And Petra just gave birth two weeks ago to another son, Ricardo.

“There’s a lot left to sort out,” Sprowles said. “We’re trying to determine who the kids are and where they’re from.”

Petra Barrera wasn’t able to shed more light on the events since she was too distraught to offer much explanation. As detectives and journalists descended on her simple stucco home in the working-class enclave of Arleta, Petra Barrera spoke of her sadness and sense of loss.

“I was so upset to hear about my beautiful boy,” Barrera recounted on Tuesday, holding back tears. She wore a gray sweatshirt, a checked dress and frayed pink sneakers; her hair was worn in a long braid, or trenza, in the style of rural Mexico. “He was such a lovely boy.”

Petra Barrera said Barragon visited her Sunday morning to tell her that her son had died in his sleep, possibly of a heart attack.

‘My husband told me, he said, ‘You have to be strong,’ ” said Petra Barrera, who authorities said is not a suspect in her son’s death. “Ernesto had an accident. He is dead.”

Barragon then told her he would make funeral arrangements and get back to her.

Instead, authorities believe that Barragon took some of his children and his other common-law wife, Juana, on a trip to find a hidden burial spot for Ernesto.

Lt. Ray Peavy, a Sheriff’s Department investigator, said that Barragon drove along Lopez Canyon Road for several minutes, telling his family that he was looking for a proper burial site for Ernesto, one they would be able to easily visit from their northeast Valley homes.

Instead, Peavy said, officials now believe that Barragon was looking for a way to hide the evidence of his crime and lied not only to Petra Barrera but to the children as well--telling them they could not arrange a legal burial for Ernesto because they were undocumented residents.

“I know why the man wanted to bury the boy this way,” Peavy said. “He killed the child.”

He added that investigators believe the boy died of blunt-force trauma to the head; an autopsy was scheduled for today.

Eventually, the family pulled its brown Honda Accord into a turnout and picked a site for the grave in a clearing surrounded by tall brush about 50 yards off the road, which runs about two miles north of the Foothill Freeway, officials said.

Ernesto’s 14-year-old twin brothers dug his grave, authorities believe. The two boys’ hands were dirty when they, a 7-year-old sister and Juana Barrera were discovered in the woods by deputies on routine patrol in the area Sunday night.

Barragon led deputies back to the grave site, where they brushed aside a thin layer of dirt to reveal the boy’s body, sheriff’s officials said.

At first, sheriff’s deputies thought the family was burying Ernesto because they couldn’t afford a funeral. But, after talking with the family, they arrested Barragon on suspicion of murder and Juana on suspicion of being an accessory to murder.

“These conversations confirmed our suspicions that [Barragon] physically abused the child,” Peavy said. “We don’t believe [the death] was accidental.”

Meanwhile, Petra Barrera told The Times that she first learned of the circumstances surrounding her son’s death and burial through TV news.

One of her children saw a news program about the death and recognized the blanket that covered the body as belonging to Ernesto. Petra Barrera, who does not have a telephone, said she went to a neighbor’s home, who called the sheriff’s office and confirmed that it was her son whose grave was shown on TV. However, it wasn’t until Tuesday afternoon, nearly 24 hours later, that sheriff’s detectives arrived to speak to her.

Petra Barrera said she didn’t believe that her husband had committed the crime and that he was never violent toward his children.

“If he killed him, then he should go to jail,” she told an interviewer for Spanish-language station Channel 34. “If he killed the child, I don’t want to know of him. If it was an accident, well . . . “

Neighbors at the home that Barragon shared with Juana Barrera said the couple were hard-working and kept to themselves. Both Barragon and Juana Barrera were known to sell their produce in neighborhood streets and parks.

Esteban Vasquez, who lives in the house abutting the converted garage, said he never heard any unusual noises from the family and was surprised to hear of the arrests.

“They were people that were dedicated to working,” said Vasquez, 23. “We used to ask him, ‘You have all those children?’ He would say, they’re not all mine. We never asked them whose they were, though.”

Times staff writers T. Christian Miller and Solomon Moore contributed to this story.