A 12-year-old boy was killed by an alligator in New Orleans earlier this week. The deceased, Bryan Vasquez, was found in a lagoon, where Police Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick said he drowned after suffering blunt force injuries inflicted by the animal.
His body was discovered Tuesday in the area of Michoud, ending a nearly two-week search that had gripped the community. Bryan, who was nonverbal and lived with a neurodevelopmental condition, disappeared early on August 14.
His family reported that he slipped out of his bedroom window around 5 a.m. Security cameras later captured him wandering nearby streets wearing only an adult diaper. That footage became the last sign of the boy before search crews uncovered his body.
When Byran’s family noticed he had vanished, they sounded an alarm, but did not get a swift response from the police, according to reports. The department came under fire after it was revealed that officers did not respond to the initial 911 call about Bryan’s disappearance for five hours. Kirkpatrick has ordered an internal affairs investigation to determine why the delay occurred.
“Something’s not right here,” Kirkpatrick said, addressing concerns about the police response. Kirkpatrick shared that internal affairs is investigating the delay. The case has also been classified as “unclassified” while investigations into the boy’s death continue,
Meanwhile, authorities have obtained a search warrant for the cell phones of Bryan’s parents. Kirkpatrick stressed the step was standard procedure in such investigations, noting that it “may mean nothing” but was necessary to review all possible angles.
The effort to find Bryan involved volunteers from the United Cajun Navy, who used drones to search through swampy terrain. The group confirmed that it was their team who finally located his body. While the discovery was heartbreaking, one official noted, “We were able to bring Bryan home.”
