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Facebook mother finds her children who were missing for 15 years

08 June 2010 00:16 (UTC +04:00)

Baku â€“ APA. A woman whose children were taken by their father almost 15 years ago has found them on Facebook, APA reports quoting â€œTimes Onlineâ€.
Prince Segalaâ€™s son and daughter disappeared in Montclair, California, in October 1995 when they were aged 2 and 3. A few days later her husband, Faustino Utrera, a healthcare worker, allegedly called and told her that he had taken them to Mexico and she would never see them again.
Police were unable to trace the missing children, but their mother never gave up. In March Ms Segala typed her childrenâ€™s names into Facebook and, to her surprise, found her daughterâ€™s profile on the social networking website.
Ms Segala â€œfriendedâ€ her daughter online and began a conversation, showing the teenager a family photograph of the parents and children together. She told her that she wanted to renew their relationship. Her daughter spurned her, saying that she was happy with her current living arrangements.
The girl said that she had been told bad things about Ms Segala and considered another woman to be her mother. She did not want to reconnect with her mother and deleted her entry on the site. Ms Segala went to the authorities with evidence from her online chats and police arrested Mr Utrera at a bus stop where he was waiting to pick up his son at Celebration High School in Osceola County, Florida.
The daughter, now 17, and her brother, 16, have been placed in the care of the Florida child welfare agency while a legal debate continues over their custody. The daughter graduated from high school last week and will soon turn 18, making her an adult.
Kurt Rowley, a deputy district attorney in San Bernardino County, said that Ms Segalaâ€™s feeling were mixed. â€œYou can imagine the feelings sheâ€™s having, not seeing her children for so many years and knowing that theyâ€™ve bonded with another family . . . but at the same time theyâ€™re almost within her grasp,â€ he told the San Bernardino Sun.
Mr Utrera is in custody and is expected to fight extradition to California at a court hearing on July 17.
Sergeant Ken Pollich of the Montclair police department said that in 22 years this was the first case he had come across in which abducted children had been found on Facebook.
He told the San Bernardino Sun: â€œItâ€™s promising to know that thereâ€™s a tool that, if itâ€™s used properly, itâ€™s working for this woman. Itâ€™s just unfortunate that it took 15 years to find them.â€
Reconnected
Richard Marks, who was given up for adoption as a baby, found his long-lost family 33 years later after tracing his sister on Facebook. He spent 15 years searching for his natural mother in Manchester before turning to the site. He messaged dozens of people with the same surname before his sister Andrea Roczniak replied: â€œI think youâ€™re my brotherâ€
Graham Corbett had not seen his son, Andy Spiers-Corbett, since he was about 2 â€” despite each attempting to locate the other. At 39 years old the son found his father by typing his name in Facebook last month and seeing a familiar picture
Paul Eaton, 56, and Dawn Pitman, 48, met when he stayed at her motherâ€™s B&B in 1982. They enjoyed an 18-month affair before going their separate ways. Both met other partners and had children but never forgot each other. They were reunited via Facebook in 2008 and married this year