Mother of Boy in Canyon Grave Is Arrested

It was the siblings of the 5-year-old Pacoima boy found in a shallow grave here in March who led homicide detectives to yet another makeshift grave, this one thought to contain the remains of their 2-year-old sister, authorities said Friday.

With the innocence of the children they are, the kids helped detectives reenact the burial thought to have occurred last year in a brush-filled area off Little Tujunga Canyon Road.

“They were able to say, ‘OK, remember we stopped here . . . and daddy told us to walk over there,’ ” said Deputy Carrie Stuart, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

Sheriff’s deputies at the grave site Friday did not know which of the siblings led investigators to the body of the buried toddler, but said they were thought to be the 12-year-old twins enlisted to help bury 5-year-old Ernesto Barrera in March.

The process that led to the discovery of the second body Thursday began when detectives investigating Ernesto’s slaying came to suspect the boy had had a 2-year-old sister who might also have been killed, deputies said.

Earlier this week, investigators traveled to Tijuana, where they discovered a birth certificate indicating that the dead boy’s parents--Marcos Barrera and his wife, Petra Barrera--were also the parents of a 2-year-old girl who was not among the children living with them when the family buried Ernesto, Deputy Steve Sciacca said.

“Questioning of siblings and family members led them to believe that this girl, too, may be buried in the forest,” Sciacca said.

“It is believed that wrapped in this blanket over there is the missing child,” the deputy said, gesturing toward a 3-foot-deep hole where homicide detectives and coroner’s investigators were huddled over a tiny body Friday morning.

Petra Barrera, 35, was arrested late Thursday in her Arleta garage apartment on suspicion of being an accessory to murder and of felony child endangerment, Sciacca said. She was being held without bail at the Crescenta Valley Sheriff’s Station and was expected to be transferred to the Twin Towers jail downtown over the weekend.

The woman’s landlord, who asked not to be named, was indignant when he heard the allegations.

“How is it possible that they would bury their children and she would continue acting normally?” he asked.

“We defended her a lot, thinking, ‘This poor woman and everything she’s been through,’ ” the man’s wife added. “Now, we know she’s no victim.”

Sciacca said investigators have found no motive for the alleged slaying and no cause of the girl’s death has yet been determined. However, information learned during the investigation implicated both Petra and Marco [Barrera], he said.

Craig Harvey, chief of the Los Angeles County coroner’s operations bureau, said the body, wrapped in several layers of blankets and plastic, was partially decomposed.

He said investigators may be able to identify the remains through dental records or X-rays but may also have to resort to more involved DNA testing.

Harvey said there were no obvious signs of trauma and that an autopsy was scheduled for today.

Marcos Barrera and Petra’s sister, Maria Ricardo Esquivel, were arrested in March after deputies found Ernesto buried off Lopez Canyon Road.

Barrera, a street vendor, is now believed to have fathered 14 children with the two sisters--eight with his wife, Petra, and six with her sister. Ernesto and the missing girl were Petra’s children, Sciacca said. The remaining Barrera children have been placed in foster care homes, he said.

Sciacca said investigators suspect that the girl, whose name detectives would not release, was killed and buried several months before Ernesto.

Ernesto’s body was found March 1 after sheriff’s deputies examined what appeared to be an abandoned car parked on Lopez Canyon Road. As the deputies inspected the car, one of Barrera’s twin boys emerged from the bushes on the other side of the road. The deputies asked where the child’s family was and he took them about 50 yards into a small clearing where they discovered the body in a freshly dug grave, with Marcos and other children standing around, apparently burying the corpse.

Barrera, 34, pleaded not guilty two months ago to charges of murder and child abuse for allegedly beating his son to death. He is being held on $1 million bail. Barrera faces 25 years to life in prison if convicted of all charges.

Esquivel, the dead boy’s aunt, was charged with being an accessory to murder and is being held on $500,000 bail. She faces a maximum prison sentence of 10 years and eight months if convicted.