LOS REYES: A topsy-turvy international child custody saga ended on Friday when a Mexican judge allowed a teenager to travel to Texas with her mother, a month after sending the wrong girl to the United States.

Dorotea Garcia and her 13-year-old daughter, Alondra Diaz Garcia, smiled as they left the court in the western state of Michoacan, walking between throngs of reporters and entering a police car to be taken to the airport.

“We’re going to the United States. We’re very happy,” Garcia said next to her black-haired daughter whom she had not seen since her then-husband took the girl to Mexico without her consent eight years ago.

The judge, Cinthia Elodia Mercado, gave custody to Garcia after DNA tests confirmed her identity on Thursday. The father, Reynaldo Diaz, voluntarily brought the daughter to Michoacan over the weekend.

Mercado had not asked for a DNA test last month when she ordered another girl, Alondra Luna, 14, to be sent to Houston after Garcia thought she was her daughter because they had a similar facial scar.

The case captivated Mexico after a video emerged of Luna being dragged out of her school screaming by police in the central state of Guanajuato.

Luna was sent to Houston even though she and her family insisted that she was not Garcia’s daughter. She spent four days in Texas until DNA tests showed she was the wrong girl.

Luna and her family travelled to Michoacan on Friday to confront the judge in Los Reyes.

“Open the door and listen to us! We want an explanation,” Alondra Luna shouted while her father angrily banged on the courtroom door.

Luna’s family has threatened to take legal action.

Published in Dawn, May 17th, 2015

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