The mother of Arizona teen Alicia Navarro, who disappeared four years ago when she was 14 and resurfaced last week in Montana, is pleading for the public and media to leave her family alone and let the police investigation into the disappearance run its course.
“Let’s focus that my daughter is alive,” Jessica Nunez wrote at the top of a post to the Facebook page dedicated to finding Navarro. “This is a miracle.”
Navarro, now 18, left a note when she left her Glendale, Arizona, home on September 15, 2019, saying she was sorry and that she would be back, as CrimeOnline reported. But for nearly four years, investigators found no sign of the teen.
Then last week, she walked into a police station in Havre, Montana — a small town not far from the Canadian border — identified herself, and asked for help getting off the missing persons list because she wanted a Montana driver’s license.
Her reappearance created a storm of publicity, even as Nunez and Glendale police asked for privacy for the family while the investigation continued. Nunez, who has spoken with her daughter once, spoke out again Sunday night, pleading with the public — and the media — to back off.
In the video posted to the Finding Alicia Facebook page Sunday night, Nunez thanked everyone for the support given during the four years Navarro was missing but said the continued push from internet sleuths and media has put her daughter “in jeopardy.”
“I know you want answers, and I do, too,” she said, reading from a statement, “but the public search for answers has taken a turn for the dangerous.”
Nunez said people have been showing up at Navarro’s home in Montana and attacking the entire family “all over the internet.”
“So I beg you, please, no more TikToks, no more reaching out to Alicia or to me with your speculations or questions or assumptions,” she said. “This is not a movie. This is our life. This is my daughter. I love her more than anything in the world, and I think I have shown you that.”
“There is an ongoing investigation, and I am begging you to move on,” she said.
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[Featured image: Alicia Navarro/Glendale Police Department]
