Men Embarrassed When Effort to Pay it Forward Mistaken for Child Trafficking

A suspected case of attempted child trafficking in Covina, where a woman said a man offered to buy her 2-year-old son, was just a misunderstanding, police said today.

Investigators contacted the man, who came to the police station today and said he was just being generous when he offered the woman $100 to buy something for the boy, according to Covina police Sgt. Gregg Peterson.

He is a successful local business owner who was with his business partner, a pastor, at the Baja Ranch Market at 425 S. Citrus Ave. Wednesday afternoon when he saw the woman and her son and offered compliments on how beautiful the boy was, Peterson said.

The 34-year-old woman had said the man approached her and her son and after showering both with compliments, asked if she wanted to sell the boy, Peterson said.

When she told him no, he continued making compliments, but focused them solely on the boy, Peterson said.

When she was done checking out, she waited for the man to leave before exiting the store with her son, but when she got to her vehicle in the parking lot, the man was parked next to her car in a brown- or Champagne-colored Honda Pilot SUV with a second man sitting in the front passenger seat, Peterson said.

According to Peterson, the man again told mother and son how beautiful they were and when the woman told him to leave them alone, he got out of the SUV, approached and pulled a $100 bill from his pocket, saying, “Can I buy your son?”

The man, still holding the bill, told her, “Go ahead and take it. Just take it.”

The man in the SUV’s passenger seat chimed in, saying, “ Just take the money.”

The woman did not answer and the man dropped the bill in her shopping cart, got into the SUV and drove off, heading south on Citrus Avenue, Peterson said.

When told the man’s account of what happened, the woman said it was possible she misinterpreted his intentions.

“The Covina Police Department is confident the incident was a misunderstanding and the men were overly complimentary and generous,” Peterson said.

“These two men were embarrassed and immediately came forward after watching the story on local media outlets.”

• City News Service