Boy kidnapped in Oakland over 70 years ago now lives on the East Coast

Luis Armando Albino was 6 years old when he was kidnapped from a West Oakland park in 1951, where he had been playing with his older brother. Now, more than 70 years later, Albino has been found.

The Mercury News first reported this week that Albino's niece in Oakland used DNA testing and newspaper clippings – and with the help of police, the FBI and the Justice Department – to find her uncle living on the East Coast.

Albino is a retired firefighter and Marine Corps veteran who served two tours in Vietnam, and a father and grandfather himself, according to his niece Alida Alequin, a 63-year-old Oakland resident who found Albino and reunited him with his family.

Albino and five of his siblings, whom their mother had brought with her from Puerto Rico, had just moved to Oakland the summer before his kidnapping in February 1951.

He was playing with his 10-year-old brother Roger in Jefferson Square Park on 7th Street, now Martin Luther King Jr. Way, near the family home, when a woman lured him away with the promise of buying him candy, the Oakland Tribune reported at the time. She then flew him to the East Coast, where he eventually ended up with a couple who raised him like their son, Alequin said.

In June, Albino was reunited with his family in California. Alequin described her family's experiences and their search for Albino. She said Albino's mother, Antonia, thought about Albino until her death in 2005. She kept a newspaper clipping of the article about his abduction in her wallet and a photo of Albino hung in the living room, Alequin said.

“She always had hope that he would come home,” Alequin told the Times.

In 2020, Alequin took a DNA test for fun and it showed a 22 percent match with the man who eventually turned out to be her long-lost uncle. But she didn't immediately realize it could be him.

Earlier this year, while reminiscing about family with her daughters, Alequin had a brilliant idea: “I started to list all of my mother's siblings, and when I got to the youngest, Luis, the baby, I stopped in mid-sentence. I can't explain what I felt, but I said, 'I don't think this person I found on Ancestry was any kind of half-brother, as I first thought. I think he was the brother who was kidnapped.'”

She said she and her daughters “searched the internet like crazy” that night and found pictures that convinced them the man they saw was their missing uncle.

Alequin turned the information over to Oakland authorities, who agreed to follow up on the lead. With the help of law enforcement, Alequin continued her search and her uncle was eventually found on the East Coast.

He provided a DNA sample that proved his identity.

When Albino was reunited with his family in California, “there were a lot of long, tight hugs and tears, and then we sat down and just talked,” Alequin said.

Albino and his brother Roger, who was there the day he was kidnapped, bonded over their military experiences. Roger was an Air Force veteran. They talked about their childhood and their lives after the kidnapping, she said.

Alequin said her uncle had some memories of the kidnapping and his trip to the East Coast, but when he asked the adults around him, they didn't give him any answers. Albino wanted to keep some of his experiences private and not speak to the media, she said.

Albino's brother Roger died shortly after their reunion this summer. Albino plans another visit to California next year, Alequin said.

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This story originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times.