The body of a baby boy believed to be King Jay Davila, whose father admitted to burying his son, was found in San Antonio on Jan. 11.
Christopher Davila, King Jay’s father, took investigators to an open field near his neighborhood, a San Antonio Police Department detective told KSAT.
Investigators then dug where he indicated and found a black backpack. Inside, the body of a baby boy was wrapped in a blanket.
According to an arrest affidavit, Davila now faces felony charges of injury to a child causing serious bodily injury, tampering with evidence, felony possession of a firearm and possession with the intent to deliver a controlled substance.
The discovery of the body came a day after officials said they came to believe that the baby was dead.
“We have statements from multiple witnesses that lead us to believe that King Jay is deceased,” Police Chief William McManus told KSAT.
“We charged [Davila, Davila’s cousin Angie Torres, and the baby’s grandmother Beatrice Sampayo] with tampering with evidence because we believe that they participated in staging the kidnapping to hide King Jay’s body so we couldn’t find it to determine what happened to him.”
San Antonio police say they believe an 8-month-old boy reported as abducted is believed to be dead, and three members of his family have been charged in the case. https://t.co/seKfqu0oBC pic.twitter.com/QN85MIxTfW
— ABC News (@ABC) January 11, 2019
Davila, Torres, and Sampayo are accused of constructing a staged kidnapping to try to fool investigators. At one point, Sampayo was spotted on surveillance footage disposing of a car seat as part of the plot.
Investigators said that Davila drove to a convenience store on Jan. 4 and left his car running and unlocked. Torres got into the vehicle and drove off. She was seen later walking down a street with a baby carrier. Initially, Davila told officers that King Jay had been kidnapped.
“This kidnapping was used as a ruse to cover up we believe early on was foul play. What other purpose would you fake a kidnapping other than to hide something?” McManus said.
King Jay’s mother, Jasmine Gonzales, is still a suspect but has not been arrest or charged as of yet.
She told KABB that she was upset. “I’m frustrated. I’m angry. I’m upset. I just want my son back home. I can’t do this no more,” she said early Friday before the body was found.
She said that she last saw King Jay on New Year’s Eve.
Gonzalez slammed people who believe she was involved.
.@BexarCoSheriff deputies are taping off an area in Rodriguez Park. The mother of missing King Jay Davila said she called them after recovering a baby bottle. Deputies aren’t saying why the area is being taped off though. @SpecNewsSA pic.twitter.com/I4xdEBc0TZ
— Sarah Duran (@_SarahDuran) January 6, 2019
“Everybody is bashing me on freaking on the Internet [sic], thinking they know anything. It’s terrible cause I’m [the] mother of my son. My son’s missing,” she said.
“Little does anybody know that I have been shedding tears. I’ve been keeping myself away from the Internet and everything because everybody is threatening me. Threatening me, thinking I have something to do with my son’s disappearance, and I don’t. What they can do, besides talking a whole bunch of mess, is help me find my son.”
Officials aren’t sure when King Jay was killed, but a witness who may have been the last person besides Davila to see the boy said King Jay was in a car seat on Jan. 4, according to an affidavit obtained by KABB.
The witness, who stayed at Davila’s house on the night of Jan. 3, said that he heard King Jay crying that night and last saw King Jay in the car seat between the hours of 9 a.m. and noon the following day.
According to an arrest affidavit, this is the field off Castle Lance where Christopher Davila admitted to police he buried his 8-month-old, King Jay. The baby has been reported missing since last Friday.https://t.co/5nbKX5K0nh pic.twitter.com/kfN7Jzh52O
— Stacy Rickard (@stacyrickardTV) January 11, 2019
Another witness said that Davila arrived at his mother’s house and that Torres looked into the vehicle and “had a shocked look on her face.” The witness tried to see what had shocked Torres but Davila repeatedly told the person to back off.
A third witness told officers that he overheard Davila and Sampayo talking before the staged kidnapping, describing them as “visibly upset and crying.”
The man also saw the pair hugging, which he found unusual because they “do not normally hug.”
A tragic and disturbing update to the disappearance of 8-month-old King Jay Davila and new information about the family members police say tried to stage a kidnapping: https://t.co/9UZCx7MCQG
— WTHR.com (@WTHRcom) January 11, 2019
