A 7-month-old toddler who was reported missing earlier this month in San Bernardino County but is now presumed to have been killed by his parents in Cabazon was a victim of long-term abuse that led to his death, District Attorney Mike Hestrin said Wednesday.
Hestrin said murder charges filed Tuesday against Jake Mitchell Haro, 32, and Rebecca Renee Haro, 41, of Cabazon, in connection with the disappearance and presumed death of Emmanuel Haro reflect “our belief that baby Emmanuel was abused, a victim of child abuse, over time and that eventually because of that abuse, he succumbed to those injuries. That’s what we believe.”
The baby’s remains still have not been found, although Hestrin said investigators “have a pretty strong indication of where the remains of baby Emmanual are,” although the search was continuing.
Jake and Rebecca Haro were arrested last week following a San Bernardino County sheriff’s investigation. Along with murder, the defendants were also charged with filing a false police report, a misdemeanor.
The defendants made a joint initial court appearance Tuesday afternoon before Riverside County Superior Court Judge Gary Polk, who appointed both the same public defender and set their arraignment for Sept. 4 at the Riverside Hall of Justice.
Jake Haro was being held without bail at the Smith Correctional Facility in Banning; his wife was being held without bail at the Robert Presley Jail in Riverside. They were taken into custody Friday at their Ramona Street residence, based on a missing person probe that soon turned to a homicide investigation.
Hestrin said the baby’s death was preventable, blaming a failure in the criminal justice system that resulted in Jake Haro being sentenced to probation in a previous child abuse case involving his ex-wife and another infant.
According to Hestrin, Haro was charged with counts including child abuse and child cruelty, and prosecutors were pushing for prison time in 2023. But Haro wound up pleading straight up to the court to all charges, and the judge sentenced him only to probation and community service.
“My prosecutor in the courtroom objected to that and said on the record we object, we think it’s a prison case and you should send him to prison,” Hestrin said. “And the judge decided, as is the judge’s right to do, in that case, he decided that Mr. Haro deserved an extra break and gave him probation and basically 180 days of work release which ends up being like community service.
“I will say that it was an outrageous error in judgment by this judge. I don’t have any problem saying that. I’m not attacking the judge personally. That decision was absolutely outrageous. Mr. Haro should have been in prison at the time that this crime happened. If that judge had done his job as he should have done, Emmanuel would be alive today. And that’s a shame and it’s an outrage.”
San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department personnel were examining potential body dump sites along the Moreno Valley (60) Freeway in the Badlands at the end of last week, without success.
Emmanuel was reported missing in the 34000 block of Yucaipa Boulevard in Yucaipa on the evening of Aug. 14.
Rebecca Haro informed deputies she had been assaulted while standing near her vehicle, changing Emmanuel’s diaper outside a Big 5 sporting goods store. The defendant suggested she was knocked out, and that the assailant fled with the tot.
“As soon as I got up, I couldn’t find my son,” she told reporters. “I checked all around my truck.”
But investigators said they uncovered inconsistencies in Haro’s initial statement, at which point she reportedly refused to voluntarily speak further with law enforcement.
On Aug. 18, San Bernardino County sheriff’s detectives served search warrants at the Haro home with the help of K9 units, and “a large amount of surveillance video” was obtained from areas of interest for review, according to the agency.
Jake Haro sought an attorney’s counsel after his wife ended her cooperation with the investigation, according to reports.
Based on the evidence collected, detectives determined the purported kidnapping in Yucaipa did not happen — ultimately determining the victim was dead.
Jake Haro was allegedly arrested again in July 2024 in Banning on suspicion of illegal possession of a loaded firearm. That case has not been resolved.
Court documents also revealed that Isabel Rebecca Gonzalez, Haro’s former spouse, filed a domestic violence retraining order against him on Aug. 19, and the request sought to protect the couple’s son, Eli.
“Jake has a criminal past,” attorney Vincent Hughes, who represented Haro in the 2023 child cruelty case, told the Los Angeles Times. “We’re not running from that, but the facts of that case are a lot different than the facts of this case. And one crime doesn’t mean that you’ve committed every other crime known to man.”
Rebecca Haro has no documented prior felony convictions in Riverside County.