Authorities are expected to reveal more information Wednesday in the case of a 7-month-old toddler reported missing earlier this month in San Bernardino County — one day after the boy’s parents were charged with his alleged murder in Riverside County.
The Riverside County District Attorney’s Office and San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department were scheduled to hold a joint news briefing regarding the murder charges filed Tuesday against Jake and Rebecca Haro in connection with the disappearance of their son, Emmanuel.
Updates regarding the ongoing search for the child’s body are also expected.
Jake Mitchell Haro, 32, and Rebecca Renee Haro, 41, of Cabazon 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 search for the missing baby’s remains is ongoing in Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
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 is being held without bail at the Smith Correctional Facility in Banning; his wife is 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.
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.
The toddler 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.
Published reports indicated Jake Haro and his former partner, identified as Vanessa Avina, were charged with child cruelty in 2018, after the couple allegedly harmed their son. Haro admitted child endangerment and was placed on four years felony probation.
The probationer 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.