{"id":215049,"date":"2026-03-11T16:09:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:09:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/215049\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T16:09:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:09:11","slug":"missing-california-girl-11-last-seen-in-2020-found-enrolled-at-north-carolina-school-under-an-alias-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/215049\/","title":{"rendered":"Missing California girl, 11, last seen in 2020 found enrolled at North Carolina school under \u2018an alias name\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

A young California girl who was kidnapped<\/a> in 2020 when she was just 5 years old has been found safe<\/a>, about 2,700 miles from home in North Carolina.<\/p>\n

The girl, identified as Karen Rojas by the organization Missing People in America<\/a>, was reported missing from Duarte, about 20 miles east of Los Angeles, on July 1, 2020.<\/p>\n

Los Angeles County\u2019s Department of Family Services had an ongoing investigation involving the child at the time she went missing, the Los Angeles County Sheriff\u2019s Department said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccording to authorities, the child\u2019s mother \u2014 who had custody \u2014 stopped communicating with DCFS personnel and was believed to have taken the child,\u201d authorities said.<\/p>\n

Last Friday, detectives received information that the child could be in Washington County, North Carolina, about 135 miles from Raleigh, and approximately 2,700 miles from Southern California.<\/p>\n

\"Karen<\/p>\n

Karen Rojas, who was kidnapped in 2020 when she was just 5 years old, has been found safe in North Carolina (National Center for Missing and Exploited Children)<\/p>\n

An investigation revealed that Rojas, now 11 years old, was enrolled at a local school in North Carolina \u201cunder an alias name,\u201d the Washington County Sheriff\u2019s Office said. <\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cAfter working in combination with multiple agencies from NC to California, the child was taken into protective custody, and is SAFE!\u201d authorities said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are very rare occurrences to have such a positive outcome on such an old case as this, but it reminds us that through hard work, and dedication, and cooperation. Stories with positive outcomes like these can happen,\u201d the sheriff\u2019s office added.<\/p>\n

No arrests were announced in the case.<\/p>\n

Due to the child\u2019s age and ongoing investigations, authorities will not be providing any additional information, the Washington County Sheriff\u2019s Office said.<\/p>\n

The Los Angeles Sheriff\u2019s Department says it will continue to work with the Department of Family Services and authorities in North Carolina on its investigation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A young California girl who was kidnapped in 2020 when she was just 5 years old has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":215050,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4954,7,9,8,348,98320,47,3426,6138,1009],"class_list":{"0":"post-215049","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-california","8":"tag-authorities","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-california-headlines","11":"tag-california-news","12":"tag-investigation","13":"tag-karen-rojas","14":"tag-los-angeles","15":"tag-los-angeles-county-sheriffs-department","16":"tag-north-carolina","17":"tag-southern-california"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215049\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}