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Indiana Amber Alert Murders: Mother Reportedly Admits To Killing Two Young Children, Reveals Cause Of Deaths [Video]

By Patricia Ramirez
Published on: 10:21 PST, Sep 28, 2016

On September 26, Indiana police issued an Amber Alert for two missing and extremely endangered children, 6-year-old Rene Pasztor and 7-year-old Liliana Hernandez. The missing and presumed abducted pair were believed to have been taken by their non-custodial mother. At the time of their abduction, they had been in their grandparents’ legal custody for about a year; when the Indiana Amber Alert was issued, the two young children were “believed to be in extreme danger.”

Tragically, as CBS News reports, just hours after the Amber Alert was issued, law enforcement’s worst fears were confirmed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BY8qF96oHLM

On Monday evening, the children’s non-custodial mother, 29-year-old Amber Pasztor, reportedly drove herself to the Elkhart, Indiana police station and engaged an officer in conversation. He was reportedly leaving the station after his shift. According to reports, the suspect in the Indiana Amber Alert abduction told the officer that she was involved in the Indiana Amber Alert and that the missing children were in the back seat of her vehicle.

“She pulled up to him and explained to him that she was part of the Amber Alert and the two kids were in the back seat.”

When the officer checked the vehicle, he found the children involved in the Amber Alert in the car as their mother had claimed. Tragically, the little ones were already dead. On Tuesday afternoon, local authorities released a statement regarding the children’s cause of death; according to the coroner, the small children died from asphyxiation.

Their deaths were also ruled to be homicides.

Following the discovery, Amber Pasztor was taken into custody and police continued their search for a second adult that had been involved in the original Amber Alert, 66-year-old Frank MacComber, a neighbor of Pasztor. His body was later found in a forested area near the pair’s homes in Fort Wayne.

According to the county prosecuting attorney, MacComber had been shot to death. How investigators found or were led to his body following the discovery of the Indiana Amber Alert murders has not been released. However, the car Amber Pasztor was driving when she turned herself and her children’s bodies over to law enforcement reportedly belonged to him. It is unknown (at least publicly) whether MacComber and Pasztor had any kind of personal relationship aside from merely being neighbors.

Investigators do believe that the 66-year-old’s death occurred before the abduction and subsequent Indiana Amber Alert.

While law enforcement and the children’s loved ones struggle to come to terms with the kids’ horrific and untimely murders, a motive hasn’t yet become clear in the case. According to law enforcement, the Amber Pasztor was somewhat calm and collected when she reported the children’s deaths to a stunned officer and she even cooperated fully as she was arrested in connection with the crimes.

However, at some point following being taken into custody, the suspect in the Indiana Amber Alert tragedy became “pretty emotional;” at that point, investigators reportedly backed off of the questioning.

According to the children’s custodial grandfather, also reportedly Amber Pasztor’s biological father, she had been struggling with drug addiction for quite some time, which was why he had custody of her two children in the first place. Her children’s biological father didn’t have custody of the kids because he, too, was violently murdered several years ago. That crime has never been solved, although Amber Pasztor was reportedly questioned at the time his body was found in a wooded area.

The mother and suspect in the Indiana Amber Alert tragedy is currently being held in the Elkhart County Jail and was formally charged with two counts of murder on Wednesday in connection with the deaths of her two young children, reports CBS News. It is unclear whether or not she may face additional charges in connection with the Indiana Amber Alert.

At this point, it is unknown whether or not the Amber Pasztor has retained legal counsel, but it is unlikely that she will be granted bail at this point in the active, ongoing investigation into the homicide-related deaths of her two children and neighbor.

In addition to her two murdered children, Indiana Amber Alert suspect Amber Pasztor is also mother to an unidentified 3-year-old; reportedly, she did not have custody of that toddler, either.

UPDATE: Elkhart Truth reports that court documents reveal that Amber Pasztor admitted to investigators that she killed her children by smothering them with her bare hands after forcibly abducting them from their custodial grandparents. Reportedly, the suspect in the Indiana Amber Alert told law enforcement that she covered her children’s noses and mouths with her hands, one by one, until they were both dead.

[Featured Image by the Elkhart County Jail]

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