FBI assisting in search for L.A. firefighter missing in Mexico

The FBI is assisting Mexican authorities in the search for a Los Angeles firefighter who was reported by his family to have gone missing in Baja California last week under suspicious circumstances.

Francisco Aguilar, a 20-year veteran of the Los Angeles Fire Department, disappeared from his condo in Rosarito, according to family members who filed a missing persons report with Mexican authorities. They said they went to check on him after he stopped communicating with them Friday and found his vehicle missing and the condo ransacked, KCAL-TV Channel 9 reported.

During a vigil at the family’s home in Montebello on Monday evening, family members said Aguilar, 48, frequently visited his condo in the town south of Tijuana, the TV station reported.

“We were on FaceTime the other day, and he was on the beach and just talking ... about how it was so much fun and this was a little taste of what retirement would be like for him,” his daughter Amaris told the station. “I just pray with every fiber in my being that my father returns to us.”

FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said the agency has offered assistance but is not leading the investigation.

“That’s their jurisdiction,” Eimiller said Tuesday. “We have to defer to Mexican authorities.”

LAFD spokesman Peter Sanders said the department is also cooperating in the search for Aguilar, who was assigned to Station 44 in Cypress Park.