A four year-old boy died in suspicious circumstances months after allegedly begging not to be sent back to live with his parents.
Noah Cuatro’s parents claim he drowned in a pool on July 6, but doctors in Palmdale, California, say the fatal injuries he sustained were inconsistent with drowning.
And his distraught great-grandma Eva Hernandez, who cared for Noah for lengthy periods after he was removed from his parents, said the youngster had been terrified of going home last November.
She explained: ‘I told the social workers, “Please. He doesn’t want to leave. He wants to stay here. He begged me.”
‘He would hold on to me and say, “Don’t send me back, Grandma.”
‘I don’t know. I couldn’t do anything. I just had to send him back.’
Hernandez first began caring for Noah when he was removed from his parents aged just three months.
He was returned to their home at nine months, but put back in Hernandez’s care a year later after being neglected and malnourished, it is claimed.
Noah spent two happy years living with his grandma, but social services returned him to his biological parents last autumn, despite his fearful protests.
The youngster’s mother then stopped Hernandez from seeing Noah until three months before his death, she says.
Recalling that meeting, the grieving woman said: ‘He was not the same little boy anymore.
‘He looked so sad and withdrawn.’
Hernandez is convinced Noah wanted to tell her something, but that his mother scared him into keeping quiet.
She told KTLA: ‘He didn’t have the chance. She was just looking at him, and he wouldn’t say anything.
‘He would say, “Grandma…” Then he would just shut down. I kept saying, “What’s wrong? Tell me baby,” and he wouldn’t say it.’
Hernandez was tipped-off by a friend that Noah was still being abused, so contacted Palmdale County’s Department of Children’s Services to ask them to make an unannounced visit to his home.
But she says social workers there rang Noah’s mom and told them they were coming.
When staff eventually visited, they found nothing that concerned them.
Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger said ‘family reunification is first and foremost’ the goal of social services.
Noah’s parents were questioned by police on Wednesday, but neither have been arrested in connection with his death.
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