May 6, 2009 10:59 pm US/Eastern
Closure Comes For Families Of Rafters Who Died
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
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It might not come as a surprise, but finding out that his grandson died while trying to reach the United States brought some closure to Umberto Gonzalez.
CBS
The trek from Cuban rafters make to Florida in search of freedom is often times a deadly journey, and Umberto Gonzalez knows of these dangers first hand, after getting news that his teenage grandson was heading to Florida.
Last August, his son called from Cuba alerting him that his grandson, 19-year-old Jorge, was heading to the United States on a small homemade raft with seven others. Gonzalez didn't like the idea of it at all.
"I asked (my son), 'How you let him go this way?'" Humberto explained in broken English. "He (then) tells me, 'don't worry; it's a good boat with good people, he'll be ok.'"
The raft left Cuba in August of 2008, around the same time Tropical Storm Fay was barreling down on the region.
Days after the raft took off Florida boaters made an awful discovery. According to Monroe County Sheriff Robert P. Peryman, four badly decomposed bodies were found floating off the Upper Keys.
The bodies were discovered over a two day period—August 21st and 22nd of 2008.
Detective Terry Smith with the Sheriff's Office was put on the case to identify the human remains.
"At that point in time we knew something unusual was going on," said Smith.
Smith checked with the US Coast Guard for reports of missing persons, but nothing turned up. Authorities say they knew then the bodies were likely those of Cuban migrants hoping to make it to America.
Media reports were sent out asking for help from the community to find out who these four people were.
Families like Mr. Gonzalez's, who were expecting loved ones from Cuba, offered up DNA and slowly closure began to take shape for those families.
"The four were eventually identified through modern science and plain ol' fashioned detective work," explained Monroe County Medical Examiner E.Hunt Scheuerman.
35-year-old Osmani Segura-Garcia was identified through matching DNA provided by his mother living in Dade County. Rolando Alberna was also identified with the help of DNA, donated by his sister who lives Miami.
Authorities say Ivan Pelaez-Taboada was positively identified because of an unusual tattoo on the inside of his lip bearing his wife's name, Raquel.
And through detailed physical and bone descriptions, the fourth body was determined to be that of 19-year-old Jorge, Umberto Gonzalez's grandson.
"My son told me, 'Wait for your grandson; tomorrow he'll be with you.' Tomorrow never happened," said Gonzalez with tears in his eyes.
All eight men on the raft died, but authorities have only positively identified those four. The investigation took a long grueling eight months, but these families now have closure and their files now read case closed.
The bodies of the four men have been released to family members here in the US.
Monroe County officials say during their investigation they were met with a number of road blocks. Florida authorities asked the Cuban government for assistance in identifying those lost at sea by facilitating DNA testing from family members in Cuba that would then be compared in search of genetic matches. The request for help was denied.
A group known as the
Cuban Democracy Movement in Miami is now heading up a campaign to get US Senators to come up with legislation that would pressure Cuba to cooperate with the process.
The group has written a formal letter to members of Congress and plan to petition President Barack Obama for support.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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