Family of Miya Marcano pleads for FBI’s help in search for 19-year-old
Miya Marcano’s family made a public plea to the FBI on Wednesday to help Orange County authorities search for the 19-year-old missing since Friday.
Semone Westmaas, Marcano’s aunt, said community searches are widespread and they need more law enforcement resources to focus their efforts.
There’s “nothing in one specific area that we can say, ‘OK, we’re getting clues,’” Westmaas said. “We don’t know where to look at this point.”
Marcano, a Valencia College student from South Florida, was last seen Friday at about 5 p.m. at the Arden Villas apartments just off University Boulevard near UCF.
She was scheduled to board a flight that evening but never made it on the plane, according to the Orange County Sheriff’s Office.
On Monday, authorities said a 27-year-old man was found dead in an apparent suicide who was a “person of interest” in Marcano’s disappearance.
The body of Armando Caballero was discovered at an apartment complex in Seminole County.
Caballero, a maintenance worker at the Arden Villas apartments, entered Marcano’s apartment without permission using a master key just minutes before she was last seen at the complex, said Orange County Sheriff John Mina.
He expressed a romantic interest in Marcano but was “repeatedly rebuffed” by the young woman, according to Mina.
Orange County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Alex Villarreal would not respond to a claim made Wednesday afternoon by Marcano’s family that she was kidnapped, saying the agency didn’t have any additional details to release and was “not able to share specifics of the investigation.”
“What we can share is that we continue to work around the clock to locate Miya,” Villarreal said. “ … Anyone with even the smallest shred of information is urged to call us.”
Marcano’s family and friends have been organizing search parties, hosted a vigil Tuesday evening and set up an Instagram account called “Bring Miya Home.”
Video clips posted on the page show Marcano’s loved ones singing her Happy Birthday at a party and her parents kissing her cheeks as she smiled wearing a graduation cap.
“We need them to know her name, know her face and tap into how the family is feeling,” Westmaas said. “We’re asking everyone [for help] not just in Orlando.”
OCSO asked anyone with information regarding this case to contact the Sheriff’s Office at 407-836-4357.
