Girl, 5, Found Abandoned at Bus Terminal Leads Police to Her Dead Mother’s Body

Connecticut police are looking for a man they suspect may have abandoned his 5-year-old daughter in a New York bus terminal after killing the child’s mother, according to multiple reports.

Police found the girl on the second-floor concourse of the Port Authority Bus Terminal Monday morning and took her to the police station where they determined that her father allegedly left her in the station, NBC New York reports.

Officials are now looking for 32-year-old Elmer Gomez Ruono, who Stamford police say is seen on surveillance video leaving the bus terminal at 8:30 a.m. — 90 minutes before the girl was found at around 10 a.m., NBC reports.

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The little girl pointed investigators to her Courtland Avenue home in Stamford, where police arrived to find the child’s mother dead, Stamford Police Capt. Richard Conklin told the Stamford Advocate.

Officials told reporters that the girl was unharmed and is now in the custody of New York City’s children services.

Conklin said Ruono was seen on the surveillance footage entering the terminal with the little girl; Lt. Tom Barcello told the publication that Ruono is a person of interest in the investigation. Barcello added that the situation is being considered a murder investigation although the woman’s death has not yet been officially ruled a homicide.

Now, as investigators search for the man, officials are working to piece together the circumstances surrounding the woman’s death, according to the Advocate.

“We know very, very little because they only moved here within the last day or two from New Jersey,” Conklin told the publication. “We are struggling to come up to speed on this very rapidly.”

The girl and her mother had recently moved to Stamford from Flemington, New Jersey, over the weekend, both NBC and WREG reports. Police said the girls’ parents had recently separated and Ruono is believed to be the girl’s father.

Police said, Ruono is about five-foot-eight, 140lbs with long black hair, and a medium build and complexion, WREG reports.