Cops Investigating Teens' Abuse Discover Sister Is Long Missing

2 siblings allege their parents abused them for years after sister went missing
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 15, 2020 3:04 AM CDT
Child Abuse Probe Turns Into Missing Persons Probe in Calif.
The missing poster for Kaya Centeno   (MissingKids.org)

Detectives in Rohnert Park, Calif., were investigating allegations of child abuse from a 15- and 17-year-old when the probe turned into a missing persons investigation. The teen siblings told police their older sister, Kaya Centeno, who would have turned 18 in May, disappeared sometime between 2010 and 2012, People reports. The family lived in Rohnert Park at the time; Gina and Jose Centeno adopted all three children in 2008. It was around the time Kaya vanished that the other kids started to be abused physically, sexually, and emotionally by their parents, they say.

Gina, 50, and Jose Centeno, 53, moved their daughter and son from northern California to Mexico about a year and a half ago, and the teens ended up in protective custody due to alleged abuse. Mexican authorities contacted Child Protective Services in the US, and CPS contacted police, who had the children returned to the state. When Kaya was last seen, she was enrolled in second grade for the 2010-11 school year; her parents withdrew her to be homeschooled. No charges have been filed in her disappearance, but the elder Centenos were arrested last month for aggravated kidnapping, charges related to the Mexico move. Other charges were later added, including torture, 9 News reports, and Jose Centeno has been charged with sexually abusing the 17-year-old girl. (More missing person stories.)

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