Mother of boy found dead in Juarez in town to pick up body

The mother of the U.S. boy whose body was found in Juárez last Tuesday was in El Paso Wednesday.

ABC-7 reporter Julio Cesar-Chavez spotted the woman and said she was on her way to Juárez to pick up the boy’s body.

Chihuahua state investigators revealed in a news conference last Wednesday that James Martin Camacho Padilla died of hypothermia. His body had no signs of violence. His family identified his remains.

“There is no doubt in the mind of the biological father,” said Jorge Arnaldo Nava Lopez, a Chihuahua state investigator .

The 7-year-old boy went missing in late January from his grandmother’s house in Juárez. His mother said the boy had autism. At the time of his disappearance, Mexican media reported the boy’s family relocated to Juárez from Washington state after the boy’s father was deported.

The owner of the cotton field found the body last Tuesday afternoon in the Riberas Del Bravo neighborhood, the same area where the boy vanished.

The autopsy revealed the boy died 10 days before being found. Investigators say the case remains open as they want to find out where the boy was for the 20 days while he was missing.

His family, Mexican authorities and the Juárez community came together to search for the boy while he was missing. El Diario reported that people said they had searched that same cotton field before and didn’t find anything at the time.

The boy’s body didn’t spend a long time in the cotton field, according to Juárez officials. He didn’t show signs of decomposition as if he had spend time outdoors.

The boy’s mother had sole custody of him, that’s why Mexican authorities didn’t release the body to the father who identified the remains.

Perches Funeral Homes will transport the body to El Paso.