A 2-year-old girl found alone on a Petaluma street in June might have been the innocent victim of a love triangle.
The girl's mother, Ana Laura Rendon, is charged with felony child endangerment, but testimony at her preliminary hearing in Sonoma County Superior Court this morning suggests the girl was taken by Rendon's boyfriend's jealous ex-girlfriend.
Jose Manuel Carmona Santiago, Rendon's boyfriend, testified that two nights before the child was found crying and barefoot on the corner of Oak and Kentucky streets at 10:30 p.m. June 20, his ex-girlfriend Andrea Palomec came into his Mountain View Avenue home through his bedroom window.
Rendon was present when Palomec said she did not want him to leave her and tried to hit him, Carmona Santiago testified.
She was angry he was dating Rendon and had previously entered his home through the bedroom window so she would not be seen by his sister Edith, her boyfriend and a couple who also lived in the house.
Two-year-old Joana was asleep on the bed by the window during the confrontation, he said.
On June 20, Carmona Santiago said he called Rendon from another sister's house around 10:30 p.m. to inform her his sister Edith saw Palomec's car near his house.
He said he told Rendon to check for it outside and said he was coming home.
When he got there, he moved his brother-in-law's car because it was improperly parked. Rendon came outside the house and they both talked for about 10 minutes in his Dodge Durango, Carmona Santiago said.
He said he did not see Joana when they went inside his house and Rendon told him she probably was sleeping in Edith's room, although neither of them checked to see if she was, Carmona-Santiago said.
He said he went to bed around 10:30 p.m., about the same time police said a Petaluma couple found the girl on the street more than a mile away, and Rendon came into his room to sleep about an hour later.
The couple who found the child called police, who were at Carmona Santiago's door the next day at 9:30 a.m.
Petaluma police said Rendon admitted she had been drinking tequila that night and still showed signs of intoxication. Rendon and Carmona Santiago told police they both thought the child was sleeping in Edith's bedroom. Carmona Santiago was released and Rendon was arrested.
After the hearing recessed this morning, Rendon's attorney Andy Martinez said that Rendon and Carmona Santiago were probably outside the Mountain View Avenue house as long as a half-hour Sunday night, meaning Joana could have been unattended.
Martinez also said Petaluma police arranged for Rendon to call Palomec on the phone while she was at the police station.
Palomec told Rendon she did not take her daughter, Martinez said.
"She (Palomec) said, 'I'm a mother, I would not take your child,'" Martinez said.
"The child just didn't walk out the front door and Andrea has a history of going through the bedroom window," Martinez said after the hearing.
Rendon can be held over for trial for child endangerment if it is foreseeable that either doing or not doing something would put her daughter in harm's way, Martinez said.
"How foreseeable is it that someone would come in through a window and take your child?" Martinez asked.
There is a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement hold on Rendon and she faces deportation even if she is convicted of a misdemeanor offense, Martinez said.
Rendon also cannot regain custody of her child unless she completes the requirements of Child Protective Services, Martinez said.
When the hearing resumes Monday afternoon, Carmona Santiago's sister Edith is expected to testify and reports by Petaluma police will be admitted into evidence with the officers' testimony.
