Two more bodies were discovered by Tijuana authorities underneath a dirt floor where a missing Garden Grove couple was recently found buried.
An unidentified man and woman were the new victims found, according to the Attorney General’s office in Baja California. There was sand and mud on the man’s corpse and white powder, believed to be lime, on the woman’s body, the San Diego Union Tribune reported.
Fire department personnel and police dogs found the new bodies, which are believed to have been buried longer than Maria Lopez, 65, and Jesus Guillen, 70, the couple from Garden Grove who were found Friday, according to investigators.
Lopez and Guillen drove to Tijuana on Jan. 10 to collect rent from tenants and were scheduled to return the same day, said Garden Grove Police Department Lt. Carl Whitney.
When their daughter could not reach them, she tracked the two through a “find my phone” app for iPhones, and it showed that the couple was still at their Tijuana property, but a relative there said they weren’t around, Whitney said. Then the phone went dead.
The couple’s pickup truck was found near their property, he said.
Mexican authorities Friday announced the arrest of the couple’s son-in-law, identified only as Santiago N., who investigators said wanted to stage a kidnapping of the couple and collect ransom.
Prosecutors in Mexico said Santiago was deported from the United States in 2012 after serving time in jail for theft. He was scheduled to be charged with the disappearance and the deaths of Lopez and Guillen.