A 3-year-old boy who had been the subject of an Amber Alert after being abducted in South Los Angeles on Thursday was found, and the alert was canceled. Elias Linarea had last been seen at about 8 a.m. Thursday near Slauson and Van Ness avenues.
The California Highway Patrol activated the alert on behalf of the Los Angeles Police Department after law enforcement identified Sonia Quintanilla as the suspect in his disappearance. Quintanilla and Elias were believed to be traveling in a gray 2008 Pontiac G6 with California license plate 6FRP150.
Quintanilla was described as a 38-year-old woman who was 5-foot-6, weighed 140 pounds, had blonde hair and brown eyes, and was last seen wearing a black sweater and pants. The relationship between her and Elias was unclear.
The Highway Patrol did not disclose where or when Elias was found, and there was no word on Quintanilla’s status when the alert was canceled. The agency says Amber Alerts are the most serious alerts it can issue involving children, and they require specific evidence that a child is in imminent danger of serious bodily injury or death.
That standard is why the alert moved quickly once the case was reported and why it could be turned off after the child was found. For Elias, the immediate danger that prompted the warning no longer existed once authorities located him. The question left behind is the one that matters now: what happened to him between the moment he disappeared and the moment officials found him?
