A California family’s 70-year-long search for their kidnapped relative ended in June after an online DNA test finally put them on the right track to the complete opposite end of the country.
Luis Armando Albino, a retired firefighter and Vietnam War veteran living on the East Coast, was kidnapped from a park in Oakland, California in 1951 when he was 6 years old.
He had been playing with his older brother when a woman wearing a bandana approached him, speaking to him in Spanish and promising that she would buy him candy if he came with her.
For many of his family members, including his mother who died in 2005, that was the last time they saw him. But the family continued to hold out hope for seven decades and always kept his memory alive with pictures of him on display in their homes.
After being kidnapped, Luis had been flown across the country and was raised by a couple on the East Coast.
Officials and family members did not specify where on the East Coast he lives today and authorities still have an open investigation into his abduction.
Luis’s niece, 63-year-old Alida Alequin, stumbled across her long-lost kinship after taking an online DNA test in 2020 “just for fun,” she said.
The test showed a 22% match with a complete stranger who would turn out to be Albino.
She tried to reach out to him but had no luck.
She and her daughters picked up the search again in early 2024 and started digging through microfilm archives of the Oakland Tribune at the Oakland Public Library.
Articles from 1951 detailed search parties’ tireless efforts to find Luis, including deep dives into the San Francisco Bay and other waterways.
His older brother Roger, who was interrogated several times, repeatedly attested that he saw a woman wearing a bandana lead Luis away.
Armed with the archives, including one with a picture of Luis and Roger, Alequin presented enough evidence to law enforcement to open a new missing person case for her missing uncle.
Oakland police recognized Alequin’s efforts, noting that she “played an integral role in finding her uncle” and that “the outcome of this story is what we strive for.”
After yet another DNA test, this time comparing Luis’ with Alequin’s mother, investigators solidified the match and told the family on June 20 that their uncle had been found.
“We didn’t start crying until after the investigators left,” Alequin said.
“I grabbed my mom’s hands and said, ‘We found him.’ I was ecstatic.”
The Federal Bureau of Investigation helped arrange for Luis and his family to come to California for the long-awaited reunion. He met Alequin, her mother, and other relatives on June 24.
Alequin told the Bay Area News Group that Luis “hugged me and said, ‘Thank you for finding me’ and gave me a kiss on the cheek.”
The next day, he visited Roger in Stanislaus County, California.
“They grabbed each other and had a really tight, long hug. They sat down and just talked,” Alequin said, including discussing the day of the kidnapping and their shared military service.
Luis, who became a dad and grandfather on the East Coast, returned to California for a three-week visit in July, just before Roger’s passing in August.
Her uncle did not want to speak to the media.
“I was always determined to find him, and who knows, with my story out there, it could help other families going through the same thing,” Alequin said. “I would say, don’t give up.”
With Post Wires.
