Texas man “missing” for 8 years was never missing at all, police say – National & International News – THU 6Jul2023

Texas man “missing” for 8 years was never missing at all, police say; activist claims mother kept son hidden and abused him.

DOJ: Armed man went to Obama home after Trump shared address online.

NATIONAL NEWS

Texas man “missing” for 8 years was never missing at all, police say

Earlier this week, a story from Texas hit national headlines after Rudy Farias, now 25, was found alive after going missing in Houston in 2015. Farias’ mother, Janie Santana, gave interviews to local news outlets, claiming a good Samaritan found Rudy unresponsive outside a church. Santana claimed Rudy had burns, cuts, bruises and other injuries and even forwarded photos of these injuries to a local news station. She claimed not to know where he’d been all this time, but said she believed he’d been abused and beaten.

Since then, conflicting and confusing details have emerged. Multiple neighbors came forward, saying they were baffled to learn that Rudy had been “missing” since 2015. Several neighbors said Rudy (who they knew as “Dolph”) had been a frequent visitor to their homes, and that he had been living with Santana all this time.

Neighbors gave further insight, saying that Rudy often wasn’t sober and that his mother Janie was very controlling of Rudy. Kisha Ross, who lived two doors down, said, “His mama has been making him go to work with her at 7 p.m., and she wouldn’t let him get no job. She wouldn’t let him do nothing. She made him stay up under her at all times”.

When reporters reached out to her, Rudy’s mother claimed the man visiting her neighbors was her nephew and not her son. The neighbors are clear it was Rudy, or “Dolph”, who was visiting them. But the story only becomes more bizarre, confusing and heartbreaking.

Reports of sexual abuse

Yesterday, a community activist named Quanell X, who mediated a police interview at a hotel at Santana’s request, came forward with very serious and disturbing allegations. According to Quanell, Rudy told him his mother had been drugging and abusing him physically and sexually for 8 years.

According to Quanell, Santana convinced Rudy that police would arrest him for running away in 2015, and for years after kept Rudy a virtual prisoner in the house. More recently, Santana allowed Rudy to visit neighbors, believing enough time had passed that no one would recognize him as a missing person.

Quanell believes police failed Rudy by not following up more thoroughly on reported sightings of him near his mother’s home. Whenever police came, Santana made Rudy hide in the house, Quanell said. 

“I never heard of a mother doing to a child what this woman did,” Quanell said. “That boy needs to go to the best drug rehab and best psychological, mental health facility we can find for him. He’s a good kid. That kid was just severely abused.”

Police confirm hoax, deny sex abuse reports

Today, Houston Police confirmed that Rudy’s missing person case was largely a “hoax” and that he’d been living with his mother all these years. Police only interviewed Rudy on Wednesday, days after he was “found”. While he did briefly go missing on March 7, 2015, detectives told reporters that Rudy returned to his mother’s home just a day or two after.

Since then, both Rudy and his mother have had multiple interactions with police during which they gave false names. Police also said they had followed up reports from family members claiming that Rudy was living “outside a family member’s home” but had never managed to find him.

In today’s press conference, police claimed not to have any formal reports of sex abuse. At this time, no charges are being filed against Santana, not even for deceiving police for years about her son’s whereabouts. However, police say the matter remains under investigation and that charges will be filed when and if appropriate.

When reached for comment following the police statement, Quanell stood by his account of his conversation with Rudy. He added that he believed that Rudy was in danger as long as he remains with his mother. Several of Rudy’s aunts agree with Quanell and expressed frustration about how the police were handling the case. The aunts also contradicted the claim by police that Rudy was back staying willingly with his mother, saying that he was actually staying with a family friend. 

Whatever the truth is, there are sure to be more twists and turns in this case. 

DOJ says armed man went to Obama home after Trump shared address online

At the end of last month, Secret Service arrested Taylor Taranto, 37, of Washington State, near a home in Washington, D.C., belonging to former President Barack Obama. At the time, Taranto was in possession of several weapons, including guns and machetes, as well as bomb making equipment which was found in the van Taranto had been living in for several weeks.

This week, the Department of Justice released more details in the case, including Taranto’s disturbing social media activity. Former President Trump shared what he claimed was Obama’s private address on his Truth Social platform. This is a practice known as “doxxing”. Doxxing is not illegal, but most social media platforms have rules against it as it is considered to be an invitation to one’s followers to do harm to the person being “doxxed”.

In fact, Taranto shared this very Truth Social post from Donald Trump, adding to his post, “We got these losers surrounded! See you in hell, Podesta’s [sic] and Obama’s [sic].” 

According to the filing from the Justice Department, on the day of his Taranto was livestreaming on YouTube from the Washington neighborhood where Obama lives. Taranto was telling his YouTube followers that he was looking for “entrance points” and wanted to get a “good angle on a shot”.

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