Boy Missing for Three Years Found Alive at U.S.-Mexico Border After Mother Triggered a Border Alert

Found at the Border, Three Years Later

Andrew Escobar was 11 years old when his mother, Miriam Felix, took him from Rio Rancho, New Mexico in July 2023 in violation of a custody agreement. He was located in El Paso, Texas after Miriam tried to cross back into the United States from Mexico and triggered some kind of border alert, according to KAOT7.

El Paso police ran Andrew's ID. It matched a missing-person listing. Authorities detained both him and his mother on the spot.

He is now 14.

What His Father Gave Up

Juan Escobar, Andrew's father, and Andrew's stepmother Monique Escobar did not wait around for investigators to find him. Juan told KAOT7 they quit their jobs entirely to search full-time. He kept marking his son's birthdays publicly, not knowing where Andrew was or whether he was safe.

"We were best friends," Juan told KRQE in January 2026. "We would always do everything together. We loved to make videos together of what we were doing and just joke around a lot. He was always joking around."

When the call came from an El Paso officer, Juan said his reaction was "shock and disbelief."

How the Alert Worked

Juan explained the mechanics to KAOT7: "His mom triggered some sort of warning, and then they checked his ID, and then that's when they recognized that he was listed as a missing person, and that's when they detained them both."

Albuquerque police had issued multiple felony warrants against Miriam Felix for violating the custody agreement. The specific nature of those felony charges was not detailed in available reporting.

Three Years, Multiple Countries

Juan disclosed that Miriam did not simply hide domestically. According to him, she traveled with Andrew through multiple countries during the three years she was on the run, including Albania and Turkey, before returning toward the U.S.-Mexico border.

A child listed as a missing person moving across multiple international borders without triggering an alert raises a serious practical question. How did this happen? The source material does not answer that question, and no official has addressed it on the record.

The Concern That Follows a Recovery

Critics of how these cases are handled argue that parental abductions involving international travel fall through the cracks precisely because Interpol notices and passport flags are inconsistently enforced across jurisdictions. A child moving through Albania and Turkey without detection over three years is a gap worth examining, regardless of the outcome here.

That said, the system did ultimately work at the point of re-entry. The border alert triggered, the ID check happened, and the missing-person match was made. Whether earlier intervention was possible is a separate question from whether the final result was the right one. It was.

What Comes Next for Andrew

Juan told KAOT7 that Andrew appears to be physically well. The emotional picture is more complicated.

"Physically, he's well, but he's just been through so much the last three years emotionally and mentally," Juan said.

A child who spent three formative years moving through multiple countries, separated from his father, and living under circumstances that required constant relocation faces a difficult road back to stability. Juan acknowledged that plainly without elaborating on specifics.

Miriam Felix faces the existing felony warrants out of Albuquerque. Whether federal charges related to international parental abduction will be filed has not been announced as of July 7, 2026.