Missing Girl Found 12 Years Later in Mexico

Sabrina Allen, a Texas girl who went missing at the age of 4 in 2002, was found alive in a small town southeast of Mexico City yesterday and is now back in the US, the Austin Police Department confirms to ABC News. Private investigator Philip Klein tells ABC that Mexican federal law enforcement, along with the FBI and US Marshals, helped retrieve Sabrina, with a minor injury sustained by one of the Mexican officials. "I am overjoyed that Sabrina has been found alive and is safe," her father, Greg Allen, says in a statement to KVUE. "Our entire family would like to thank the investigators that made this happen. ... They never gave up."

While Sabrina, now a teenager, is getting checked out by US doctors, Klein says police have taken a suspect into custody: Sabrina's mother, Dara Llorens, who was found with Sabrina and who is now being held in Travis County Jail. Llorens is alleged to have kidnapped Sabrina from her estranged husband during a weekend visit, notes KVUE; Allen says Llorens had mental health issues and had warned him previously she was going to take Sabrina. Llorens reportedly went to great lengths to escape detection and changed the girl's hair color, according to My Fox 7. She's being held on aggravated kidnapping charges, with bond set at $300,000, KVUE reports. Local police and the FBI are set to hold a news conference later today. (Read about two other kids allegedly taken by people they knew who were happily reunited with family years later.)