Argentine Security Minister Patricia Bullrich announced on Saturday a major breakthrough in the case of Loan Danilo Peña, a five-year-old who went missing in the northern province of Corrientes on June 13.

According to Bullrich, Loan’s aunt Laudelina Peña confessed before federal prosecutor Mariano de Guzmán that retired Navy captain Carlos Pérez ran over the child with a white Ford Ranger. His wife, municipal official Victoria Caillava, was also in the vehicle. Laudelina claimed that she didn’t say anything because the couple asked her to keep silent to cover up the accident.

“Laudelina gave a strong and credible confession,” Bullrich said in an interview with media outlet La Nación. “She confessed that it was an accident in which Pérez and Caillava participated, that they went with the van and ran over [Loan], but then turned it into a cover-up.”

Corrientes governor Gustavo Valdés also announced that a “major step” had been taken in solving the Loan case. “All the proceedings are being referred to the Federal Justice so that it may proceed under the law,” he stated in a post on X. 

Argentine media reported that Buenos Aires and Federal Police forces would continue the search in a landfill in the 9 de Julio area and the field of the boy’s grandmother. Investigators will also look for traces in Pérez and Caillava’s truck.

The disappearance of Loan Peña

On June 13, Loan Danilo Peña’s father took him for lunch at his grandmother’s. It was the five-year-old’s first time visiting her in the small rural town of 9 de Julio, Corrientes province. At around 3 p.m., he went orange picking with some cousins in a nearby field, an uncle, and two of his uncle’s friends. As the afternoon wore on, the adults said they realized he wasn’t with the group. They returned to the house and found that he wasn’t there, either. Loan has not been seen since that afternoon, and the case made national headlines.

Loan’s family reported his disappearance to the police. Although it was initially treated as a missing person’s case, federal authorities later began investigating his disappearance as a possible case of child trafficking. Five of his grandmother’s guests have been arrested, along with the local police chief who first led the search, who is accused of planting a shoe belonging to the kid.

The federal judiciary took on the case once the trafficking lead surfaced. At that point, Bullrich said the ministry she leads would participate in the search.

“Now I am going to go all in. I’m going to go with divers, I’m going to go with bush personnel, and I’m going to go with radiological equipment to see the belly of animals (sic),” she said in an interview two weeks after the child’s disappearance. “I am going to go with everything. And yes, you have to go with everything because there are caimans and pumas.”

Laudelina’s confession, however, has now turned the investigation upside down.