Gabriel Fernandez: How a Child Asked for Help 60 Times and Was Ignored

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In 2013, an eight-year-old boy was rushed to the hospital and Palmdale, California.

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His mother said he hid his head while playing with his brother.

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That would have been tragic enough, except doctors took one look at him and knew she was

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lying.

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His injuries weren't from rough housing.

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They were for something else entirely.

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That night, paramedics didn't just respond to a medical emergency.

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They walked straight into a crime scene, one that had been playing out for months, ignored

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by the very people who were supposed to stop it.

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This is the story of Gabriel Fernandez, a little boy who asked for help more than once

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and never got it until it was too late.

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Before we dive in, if you like your true crime brief and bingeable, you're in the right

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place.

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Hit follow now for at least two episodes per week.

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This is 10-minute murder.

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Let's get into it.

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On the night of May 22, 2013, paramedics in Palmdale, California were dispatched to what

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they were initially told was a medical emergency involving an eight-year-old boy who would suffer

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to head injury while playing with his older brother.

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When they arrived, it was immediately clear this was no accident.

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Gabriel Fernandez lay unresponsive inside the apartment.

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His small body battered and broken.

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He wasn't breathing.

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He had no pulse, blood covered him.

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The paramedics worked quickly, loading him into the ambulance and performing CPR.

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Against the odds, they got his heart beating again.

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It wasn't much, but it was enough for the ER doctors to try to save him.

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Then just minutes later, his heart stopped again.

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Doctors and nurses at the hospital fought to stabilize Gabriel, and as they did, a horrifying

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reality unfolded.

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His injuries weren't just severe.

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They didn't match the story they'd been given.

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A simple head injury from playing too rough shouldn't come with cigarette burns, missing

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teeth, or deep bruising across his entire body.

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Gabriel had black eyes, ligature marks around his ankles, and scrapes on his legs that looked

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like he'd been dragged.

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Beebegun pellets were embedded in his skin.

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His ribs were broken.

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His skull was fractured.

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There was no version of events where this was anything other than prolonged, deliberate

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torture.

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As Gabriel lay in the hospital bed, barely clinging to life, the people around him began

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piecing together a story that should have never been possible.

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As Gabriel Fernandez lay in the hospital bed, barely clinging to life, investigators started

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looking for answers.

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They didn't have to look very far.

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The person that they turned to was his mother, Pearl Fernandez, a woman whose past was as

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troubled as they come.

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She had spent much of her childhood in and out of jail, racking up a criminal record while

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blaming her behavior on the beatings she endured at home.

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By the time she was nine, Pearl had already turned to alcohol and meth.

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By 11, she had dropped out of school and run away.

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She bounced from place to place, often staying wherever she could define shelter.

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According to Pearl, that meant spending time in some truly dangerous situations.

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She later claimed that she'd been raped by an uncle, then kidnapped and held hostage

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by a group of men who assaulted her for days.

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If her accounts are to be believed, Pearl's life had been a series of traumas, one after

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the other.

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She was later diagnosed with multiple mental illnesses, including a developmental disability

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that reportedly put her verbal comprehension skills at the level of a second grader, PTSD,

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and a possible personality disorder.

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Her own family described her as someone constantly battling the demons inside her.

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Pearl's relationships followed the same pattern, unstable, violence and abusive.

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When Gabriel was hospitalized, she was living with her long-term boyfriend, Esario Aguirre.

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By most accounts, Esario didn't seem like a threat.

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People who knew him described him as mild mannered, quiet, even helpful.

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His biggest academic achievement was repeating two grades before dropping out of high school.

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But after that, he worked a steady job at the Woodland Park Retirement Hotel, where his

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former boss called him down to earth.

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But whatever version of Esario those people knew wasn't the one Gabriel met.

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The man in that apartment, the one in charge of an eight-year-old boy, was something else

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entirely.

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And Pearl, she wasn't the same mother to Gabriel that she was to her other children, not

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even close.

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By the time Gabriel Fernandez entered the world, his mother had already decided she wanted

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nothing to do with him.

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He was the fourth child born to Pearl and her then boyfriend, Arnold Contreras.

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But unlike her other children, Pearl didn't even pretend she wanted to keep him.

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Shortly after giving birth, she made a call to her great-uncle, Michael Limos Caranza,

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with the warmth of a customer returning a defective toaster told him, "Come get this kid because

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he's getting on my nerves."

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Michael and his long-term boyfriend, David Martinez, were overjoyed.

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They took him in immediately and raised him in a home filled with love and stability.

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Pearl, on the other hand, didn't even wait to make sure the transfer went smoothly.

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She abandoned Gabriel at the hospital three days after giving birth.

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For the next several years, Gabriel lived with Michael and David, thriving in a home

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where he was wanted.

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But by 2009, an outside force disrupted that happiness.

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His grandfather, Robert Fernandez.

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Robert took issue with his grandson being raised by two men, convinced that their influence

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was "turning him gay."

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His evidence, Gabriel openly told Michael and David how much he loved them.

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According to Robert, that was an affection that was indoctrination.

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Pearl stayed out of the argument, likely because engaging would have required some effort.

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In the end, Robert won.

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Gabriel was taken from the only real parents he had ever known and placed in his grandparents'

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home.

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Gabriel hadn't even settled into his new home yet before another custody battle began.

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This time, Pearl wanted him back.

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No one in the family believed this was about maternal instinct.

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Michael, David, and Gabriel's grandparents fought to keep him away from her.

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But in the end, biology beat logic.

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Pearl had the legal right to take him, and in 2012, she did exactly that.

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She and Isario picked up Gabriel under the pretense of taking him to a family barbecue.

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By the time his grandparents realized they had been deceived, it was too late.

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Gabriel was gone.

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He was now living in Palmdale, in an apartment where home meant something very different to

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what he had known before.

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In just eight months, Gabriel Fernandez went from a happy, thriving child to a battered,

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broken body fighting for life in a hospital bed.

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His new home with Pearl Fernandez and Isario wasn't a home at all.

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It was a torture chamber.

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Gabriel wasn't just abused.

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He was systematically destroyed.

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His bones were broken.

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He was forced to eat cat litter, feces, his own vomit, and expired food.

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They shot him repeatedly with a BB gun, aiming at his face and groin.

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They pepper sprayed him, forced him into freezing cold showers to keep the bruises from

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being too visible and knocked out his teeth with a baseball bat.

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They strangled him.

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They tied him up.

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They gagged him.

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And as if the physical abuse wasn't enough, they wanted to break him in another ways too.

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They forced him to wear women's clothing, convinced that being raised by his great uncle

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Michael and his partner David had turned him gay.

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At night, Gabriel didn't get a bed.

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He got the box.

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It was a small cupboard in Pearl and Isario's bedroom.

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He was handcuffed to the metal handles on the outside and locked inside for hours.

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He wasn't let out, not to eat, not to use the bathroom.

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His older siblings would sneak him food when they could, but most nights, if he had to relieve

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himself, he had to do it inside the box, then clean it up later.

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Even when social services came knocking, Gabriel wasn't safe.

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Pearl and Isario had a system.

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They would stuff a sock in his mouth or tie a bandana around his face, ensuring that

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no matter how badly he wanted to beg for help, he couldn't make a sound.

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Gabriel's suffering wasn't a secret though.

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More than 60 complaints were filed against Pearl and Isario by family, by neighbors, by teachers.

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And yet, nothing happened.

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The open investigation into suspected abuse only made things worse.

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It blocked his family from stepping in.

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His grandfather Robert desperately wanted to take Gabriel back, but was legally forbidden

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from doing so while the case was active.

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If he had taken Gabriel, he could have gone to jail, and Gabriel could have been sent straight

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back to Pearl.

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From a legal standpoint, Gabriel was forced to stay in the home that would kill him.

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After two days in the hospital, Gabriel succumbed to his injuries.

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Pearl and Isario were arrested and charged with child abuse and first-degree murder.

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When asked why they tortured and eventually killed him, Pearl said she had beaten Gabriel

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as punishment for not picking up his toys.

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Isario's reasoning was even simpler.

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Gabriel was gay.

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Pearl pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

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In 2021, she filed a petition to have her sentence reduced.

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It was denied almost immediately.

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Isario went to trial where a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder and torture.

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He was sentenced to death.

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But California's moratorium on capital punishment means that Gabriel never got to see his ninth

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birthday.

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The man who took his life will likely spend the rest of his life behind bars waiting for

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an execution date that may never come.

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Thanks for listening to Ten Minute Murder.

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Mystery.

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