Key Points

Expressing his appreciation for India, the head of the FBI office in Dallas, Special Agent R Joseph Rothrock, said, “This successful outcome resulted from international collaboration between the FBI and our domestic and global partners”.

“The return of Cindy Rodriguez Singh from India is a new chapter in the search for answers in the disappearance of Noel Alvarez”, her son.

Singh was located by Indian government authorities, and after arrival in the US, she was handed over on Thursday to the Sheriff’s Office in Tarrant County, where the alleged murder took place, according to the FBI.

If she is convicted of murder, she could face the death penalty in Texas.

Rodriguez Singh, 40, is not of Indian origin and is described by the FBI as a White Hispanic born in Dallas.

The agency did not identify her husband, but a local TV station, Fox4 in Dallas, reported that local officials named him as Arshdeep Singh.

The station said that a warrant was issued for his arrest by local authorities, alleging “abandonment and endangering a child”.

Alvarez has been missing since October 2022, and his body has not been found, according to authorities.

The White House said in a post on X that Rodriguez Singh was the fourth person on the 'Ten Most Wanted' list to be captured in the last seven months, “thanks to the Trump Administration".

“That is as many as Joe Biden did in four years”, the White House added in a jibe at the former President whom President Donald Trump has accused of being soft on crime.

On March 20, 2023, alerted by the Family Protective Services, Everman police visited Rodriguez Singh to check in on Alvarez, and she claimed that the boy was in Mexico with his biological father.

Two days later, she and her husband and six of her children boarded a plane in Dallas for India and disappeared, according to the FBI.

The reasons for the alleged killing remains murky but police said that Rodriguez Singh was the follower of a bizarre cult that worshipped a figure known as “Sante Morte” or “Holy Death”.

Craig Spencer, who was Everman police chief at the time of Alvarez’s disappearance, told the Fox station that “Sante Morte” is “the patron saint that offers protection to the [drug] cartel and those kinds of activities”, he was quoted as saying.

Spencer said that Rodriguez Singh had told witnesses that Alvarez, who had physical and developmental problems, was a “demon”, according to the station.

Rodriguez Singh had given birth to twins a week before when Alvarez disappeared, Spencer said.

Just before the family left for India via Istanbul, Arshdeep Singh had stolen $10,000 from a store where he had worked, he said.

Investigators contacted the child's biological father in Mexico, who told them that he had never seen his son because he was deported before the boy was born, according to Spencer.

- IANS