Police Solve Toddler’s 1980 Murder

Police have gotten confessions from two people charged with killing a two-year-old boy in Hialeah, Fla., 25 years ago: his mother and stepfather.

After reopening the cold case of Adrian Mejia, who was beaten to death on Sept. 10, 1980, police say they interviewed the witnesses and the medical examiner to obtain the evidence they needed to crack the case. Investigators discovered the boy’s mother and stepfather, Blanco Pardo and Miguel Perez, left Florida and went to Columbia before moving back to the United States, this time in New York.

Police say they suspected the child’s mother of beating him to death when he died, but at the time they didn’t have enough evidence for an arrest.

Pardo and Perez are being held in New York. Police say the couple will be extradited to Florida, where they will face first-degree murder charges.