Yair Anthony Carillo,4-day-old baby

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Relatives question why state took kidnapped baby

Last Update: 10/08 5:37 am

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - A relative says Maria Gurrola started crying and shaking when she learned her kidnapped baby was being taken into state custody shortly after he was recovered.

Norma Rodriguez said Gurrola told her the second separation was more painful than the knife wounds she suffered when the kidnapper attacked her.

Week-old Yahir Anthony Carrillo and his siblings were put with strangers in two separate foster homes after investigators told the state Department of Children's Services about allegations the family had tried to sell the baby.

On Tuesday, Metro Nashville Police announced the parents had been cleared of wrongdoing and the children were returned.
DCS spokesman Rob Johnson said the department sometimes has to make tough decisions with partial information.

http://www.actionnewsjax.com/content/top.... IFXGJIwjA.cspx

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Timeline Of Juvenile Records Leak Analyzed

Associated Press
Published: October 12, 2009

Investigators looking into the leak of confidential juvenile court records that accused the parents of a kidnapped newborn of trying to sell the baby are zeroing in on the sequence of events to figure out who improperly released case documents.

Amid the continuing investigation into Yair Anthony Carillo’s abduction, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation opened a separate probe into the records leak this week. Spokeswoman Kristin Helm said the timeline of when authorities and child welfare officials learned about the allegations and when the news media reported them is significant. The family has since been cleared but their lawyer has acknowledged the allegation led state officials to take custody of Carillo and his three siblings soon after he was found in Alabama.

The allegations were reported by news media, citing confidential sources, the same day documents in the case were filed in juvenile court. Clerk Vic Lineweaver says his office wasn’t involved in the leak.

http://www2.tricities.com/tri/news/local....analyzed/33995/

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Nashville baby-kidnapping suspect led many lives

Associates call Silas friendly; aliases, record tell another tale

By Chris Echegaray and Kate Howard • THE TENNESSEAN • October 11, 2009


Martin Rodriguez Guerrero, boyfriend of Tammy Silas, says she wanted a baby but was unable to have children after a failed pregnancy. JOHN PARTIPILO / THE TENNESSEAN

There are no family photos in Tammy Renee Silas' house, and the red photo album on the dining room table that was supposed to be filled with pictures of her new baby is empty.

A stack of mail has piled up with letters for Tammy Silas, Tammy Hernandez and Tammy Gonzalez.

She also could be Tammy Thomas or Tammy Gwyn, and her aliases have been associated with nearly 30 addresses in Alabama, Tennessee, Ohio and a half-dozen other states. While little is known about Silas' childhood or family ties, her criminal record as well as friends and neighbors describe a diligent, friendly woman who couldn't have children but carried a troubled past, with arrests for forgery and connections to an unsolved Nashville homicide case.

Silas, 39, faces life in federal prison on charges she kidnapped newborn Yahir Anthony Carrillo and took him to her home in Ardmore, Ala., to raise as her own. Police believe she stabbed the baby's mother, Maria Gurrola, nine times with a knife before taking the child, though she has not yet been charged in the attack. Gurrola is recovering and has been reunited with her baby.

When Silas got to Alabama, she renamed the baby Martin, said Silas' boyfriend, Martin Rodriguez Guerrero. Baby clothes are still piled high in their Alabama dining room, ready to be donated to family and friends. The bassinet in the master bedroom remains there, until her boyfriend finds a family member who needs it.

Friends and acquaintances say Silas told them she couldn't have children. The reason, her live-in boyfriend says, was a failed pregnancy when she was young.

"I think it was one of those things that she had hope or some illusion about having one," Guerrero said in Spanish. "I do remember when she told me about her pregnancy problem."

Bankruptcy, bad checks

Creditors in a 1990 bankruptcy case support Guerrero's story. Silas, then 20, listed most of her creditors as medical centers, including an obstetrician's office.

Trouble followed Silas after that. In 2002, she was arrested in two Ohio counties on charges of forgery and possessing criminal tools. The forgery charges led to her being sentenced to five years' probation for passing bad checks in Montgomery County, Ohio.

But when she was arrested and charged with possessing criminal tools in Greene County, Ohio, she never reported the arrest to her probation officer or showed up in court. A warrant for her arrest didn't catch up with her until she was questioned in Nashville in 2004 about a homicide.

Ramon Hernandez-Trejo, 27, had been shot in the head and dumped on a dead-end road in South Nashville. Silas told police she was his wife, although they never saw documentation to prove it. She had been using his last name.

"They both lived in Nashville, although they were separated at the time," said Metro detective Mike Roland, who questioned Silas. "They had separate addresses."

Silas was living on Cathy Jo Court in South Nashville, about three miles from the home where baby Yahir Carrillo would be stolen nearly five years later. Police never developed any solid leads in the shooting death of Hernandez-Trejo, although they considered the possibility that the motive could be drugs or related somehow to the Mexican Mafia.

"We never could substantiate anything," Roland said.

Asked if Silas had been a suspect, Roland said there was never a solid suspect in the still-open case. "When I investigate a homicide, everybody is a suspect till we figure out who did it," Roland said.

When police finished questioning Silas, she was charged with being a fugitive from justice because of the pending warrant in Ohio. The fugitive charge was dropped when she was extradited back to Ohio, and she served several months in jail before she was returned to probation, court records show.

Guerrero said he knew about Silas' past, and that made him skeptical the adoption she was trying to arrange in late September would work out.

Silas told friends and acquaintances she was heading to Texas to adopt or have the court grant custody of a relative's newborn. The relative, she told them, was a woman involved in drugs.

"I know that in the United States and in Mexico there is this same law that you can't adopt if you've been to jail," he said. "I told her she was just wasting her time and our money.''

Five days before the abduction of baby Yahir, Tammy Silas drove to Nashville from Alabama, telling Guerrero she was flying to Texas. A baggage claim sticker on her luggage at her house shows that Silas took an American Airlines flight from Texas to Nashville in the late evening on Sept. 28, the day before the baby's abduction.

Guerrero believed Silas had relatives in Texas because she grew up in Mesquite, the daughter of a Mexican-American father and an American mother. She has two older siblings, a brother and a sister, but the boyfriend never met her family, and Guerrero said Silas told him her parents died years ago.

'You could count on her'

Guerrero says he first met Silas when she was married to a man named Jose Gonzalez. The couple ran A-1 Framing & Remodeling & Roofing in Ardmore.

They subcontracted with several local businesses and lived with their work crew. They rented a home in Madison County, Ala., and split the cost with the six people in the work crew, including Guerrero. "She was strict if nothing else," Guerrero said.

Guerrero said he got personally involved with Silas after Gonzalez left for Mexico more than two years ago.

Local merchants, customers and contractors who complimented Silas' work ethic and drive don't believe Silas was capable of hurting Maria Gurrola.

"We were as surprised as anyone, but we think there's more to that story,'' said Ray Lewis, of Alabama. He became friends with Silas and Guerrero after they framed two houses for him.

"She would not charge me for everything," he said. "You could always count on her to be here with her crew."

Neighbor Jean Colston also finds it hard to believe Silas is charged with kidnapping a baby. "She is the nicest person,'' Colston said. "She said she couldn't have children but didn't say anything about wanting a child so badly."

Market owner Larry Satterfield remembers seeing Silas and Guerrero with a baby just days after Nashville police launched a search for baby Yahir on Sept. 29.

The couple would drop in to their neighborhood market twice a day in Ardmore — in the morning to get a breakfast biscuit and in the evening for sandwiches. Guerrero went inside the store as Silas waited in the truck with Yahir in a carrier. Guerrero looked a bit sleep deprived, Satterfield said, but seemed happy.

"There are people who need to have a baby, people who deserve to have one and people who don't," said Charlotte Satterfield, the store owner's wife. "She needed one. She would take care of a baby very well. It's sad."

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20...led+many+lives

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The Tammy Silas luggage tags from Nashville to Dallas fort worth Texas.


The "interrogation room" where police questioned Tammy Silas at boyfriend Martin Rodriguez Guerrero home in ardmore, Alabama.

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Larry Satterfield, owner of Larry's market said Silas brought the baby in his store and talked about wanting to adopt a child. Satterfield said he was shocked when he heard that Silas had kidnapped the baby.


Martin Rodriguez Guerrero , boyfriend of Tammy Silas, in Ardmore, Alabama.

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Ray Lewis, a resident of Ardmore, Alabama said Tammy Silas was a hard worker and framed his home in Ardmore. Lewis said there is more to this story.


A pile of baby clothes at Martin Rodriguez Guerrero and Tammy Silas's home in Ardmore, Alabama.

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The alabama drivers license of Tammy Silas.

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A family reunited: From left, Orlando, Cristian and Estrella watch TV as Maria Gurrola and husband Jose Antonio Carrillo touch their newborn baby Yahir Anthony Carrillo.



Maria Gurrola is reunited with her children after she was stabbed and her baby was kidnapped from her Nashville home.

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Maria Gurrola holds her baby Yahir, who was kidnapped. Gurrola says she still has nightmares but is doing better now that the baby and her children are all back together.



Maria Gurrola and her husband, Jose Antonio Carrillo, said they are so happy to have their newborn Yahir returned to them.

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Safe and sound, Yahir Anthony Carrillo sleeps in his mothers arms at a home in Nashville on Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2009.



Jose Antonio Carrillo, father of 8-day-old Yair Carrillo-Gurrola, is thankful that his son was found. Jose was at the home where his son was kidnapped on Saturday Oct 3, 2009. The baby has not been returned to the parents at the time of photo.

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Alabama woman charged with kidnapping Tennessee infant was questioned in 2004 murder

October 13, 2009

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Police say an Alabama woman charged in the kidnapping of a Tennessee infant was questioned nearly five years ago in the murder of a Nashville man she claimed to be married to.

Tammy Renee Silas is charged with kidnapping 4-day-old Yahir Anthony Carrillo from Nashville on Sept. 29. The baby was found with Silas three days later at her home in Ardmore, Ala., about 80 miles south.

Don Aaron, a spokesman for Nashville police, said Silas was questioned regarding the fatal shooting of Ramon Hernandez-Trejo in November 2004 and then was extradited to Ohio on a probation violation. The case has not been solved.

Kristin Helm, a spokeswoman for the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, said at this point, the homicide case doesn't appear to be related to the kidnapping.

http://blog.al.com/live/2009/10/alab..._with_kid.html

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Agents Search Home Where Tenn. Infant Found

POSTED: 5:30 pm CDT October 14, 2009

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Investigators returned to the Alabama home where a kidnapped Tennessee newborn was found to look for more evidence in the crime.

FBI spokesman Joel Siskovic said Wednesday that agents searched the home of Tammy Renee Silas on Friday. The 39-year-old Silas has been charged with kidnapping Yair Anthony Carrillo on Sept. 29 in Nashville.

Police traced the infant to Silas' home in Ardmore, Ala., about 80 miles south of Nashville, three days later.

Siskovic said investigators were looking for anything that is related to the crime, such as weapons, phones or computers. He declined to say what was found.

Defense attorney Isaiah Gant didn't immediately return a call seeking comment.

Authorities haven't yet charged anyone in the knife attack on the baby's mother, and they said the investigation continues.

http://www.wsmv.com/news/21298627/detail.html

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Woman Charged With Kidnapping Newborn To Appear In Court

WHNT News 19 Staff Reports
6:00 PM CST, November 1, 2009

The woman charged with kidnapping a Tennessee newborn is scheduled to be in court this week.

39-year-old Tammy Renee Silas has a bond hearing set for Monday in federal court in Nashville.

The Ardmore, Tennessee woman was arrested early last month.

Investigators say Silas posed as an immigration agent when, according to them, she kidnapped Yair Anthony Carrillo and stabbed his mother back in September.

Carrillo, who was only four days old at the time, was found a few days later at Silas' home in Ardmore.

Silas has given a statement to police, but they have not released any details or a motive in this case.

http://www.whnt.com/news/whnt-tammy-silas-court-appearance,0,3894607.story

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Ardmore woman charged with kidnapping Tenn. infant attempted suicide, says attorney

By The Associated Press

November 02, 2009

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- The attorney for a woman charged with kidnapping a Tennessee newborn said Monday his client has tried to commit suicide since she's been locked up and that certain medications for her mental health are being withheld.

Attorney Isaiah Gant asked a federal judge during a preliminary and detention hearing to investigate Tammy Renee Silas' claim that she is being mistreated at the Robertson County Jail and to consider moving her to another facility.

Gant told the judge that Silas has been told that U.S. Marshals ordered the jail to withhold her medication. He said he's noticed that Silas has become increasingly disoriented, which has effected his ability to communicate with her.

When a reporter asked about scars on Silas' wrists after the hearing, Gant said she tried to kill herself. He said he was unsure what kind of medications Silas is supposed to be taking.

"Which ones she's getting, which ones she's not getting, and what she was getting in the past before she got here, I'm still trying to find out," Gant said.

A woman who answered the phone at the Robertson County Jail refused to comment. But a prosecutor told the judge during the hearing that he would confer with the U.S. Marshal's Office and possibly have a report for him by the end of the week.

Besides being deprived of her medication, Gant told the judge that Silas was afraid "someone might put something in her food." Gant told reporters Silas hasn't eaten any solid food in at least a week and that she told him she found a tack in one of her meals.

He said he thinks she is depressed.

"I'm told that she eats oranges occasionally and drinks liquids," said Gant.
The 39-year-old Silas was charged with kidnapping Yahir Anthony Carrillo on Sept. 29 in Nashville. Police traced the infant to Silas' home in Ardmore, Ala., about 80 miles south of Nashville, three days later.

Last month, investigators returned to Silas' home to look for more evidence.

Authorities haven't yet charged anyone in the knife attack on the baby's mother, and have said the investigation continues.

Maria Gurrola, 30, told police that she was at her Nashville home with her baby and her 3-year-old daughter when a blond, heavyset woman came to the door claiming to be an immigration officer.

Gurrola said the woman tried to arrest her and then repeatedly stabbed her with a knife. Gurrola told investigators that at one point she heard the woman make a phone call and tell someone in Spanish that "the job is done" and that the mother "was dying."

After three days of searching, investigators got a break when a car was seen on a surveillance video following Gurrola before the attack, and the car rental information led police to the home near the Tennessee-Alabama state line.

http://blog.al.com/live/2009/11/ardm..._with_kid.html

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Yair Carillo's Kidnapper Tammy Silas Spent Months Planning Abduction

By Pete Kotz in Child Abuse, Heroes, assault, kidnapping
Monday, Oct. 5 2009 @ 10:31AM


Martin Rodriguez Guerrero didn't know the boy named after him had been kidnapped

Martin Rodriguez Guerrero and Tammy Silas, his girlfriend of two years, often discussed having a baby. They worked at a remodeling company in Ardmore, Alabama -- he in construction, she in translating for the Mexican workforce. But for some reason she was unable to give birth.

So Martin wasn't surprised when Tammy began discussing adoption. She'd apparently spent months preparing for the baby's arrival, buying formula and blankets. Martin, not the inquisitive sort, didn't probe too much on how all this was supposed to go down.

When she called to have him pick her up at the airport, saying she'd adopted a baby in Texas, he had no reason to believe it wasn't legit. The boy they would call Martin Jr. was healthy and happy. What he didn't know is that Tammy had stabbed the mother of the newborn eight times in order to kidnap the boy...
The brutal abduction had taken place in Nashville (see original story here). The boy's real name was Yair Carillo, and his mother, Maria Gurrola, was now hospitalized with deep stab wounds and a collapsed lung.

We still don't know how or why Tammy picked Maria as a target. Initial theories indicated that Maria's yard sign exclaiming "It's a Boy" prompted the kidnapping. But True Crime Report has a different thesis: The morning of the abduction, Maria says she went to the Nashville WIC office before stopping by Wal-Mart. Our guess is that Tammy selected her at WIC and then began to stalk her.

WIC, a federal program providing basic necessities like formula to poor women with children, is the perfect place to find a child to abduct. And according to Wal-Mart surveillance tape, a blue Kia seemed to be following Maria that day. The driver of the Kia parked near Maria and waited as she did her shopping, then followed her again out of the parking lot.

Unfortunately for Tammy, Nashville police did a masterful job locating the car. They traced it back to a rental agency at the Nashville airport, then used the cell phone number given to the rental company to track down Tammy. Police also discovered from cell phone records that she had been close to Maria's home at the time of the abduction.

Yair is now safe and sound. Tammy, meanwhile, is looking at a long stretch in the pen. And it's good that the baby boy will never call Martin "dad." When interviewed after his girlfriend's arrest, he seemed less interested in her pending incarceration than in how he'd support himself with only one income.

http://www.truecrimereport.com/2009/...pper_tammy.php