The geography of Gallup, New Mexico, is unique in that it lies along the Trails of the Ancients Byways, known for scenic beauty and historical significance, and the famous Route 66. Located in the northwestern part of the Land of Enchantment, Gallup is mentioned in the song “(Get Your Kicks) on Route 66.”

Gallup is also known as the “Heart of Indian Country” because it is on the edge of the Navajo reservation. A large percentage of its approximately 22,000 residents are Native American, with the Navajo comprising the largest tribe. The Navajo way teaches that people are good, but a Gallup child of part of Navajo descent has been missing for thirty-eight years, the victim of an abduction.

In the early morning hours of April 6, 1986, someone galloped out of Gallup having kidnapped nine-year-old Anthonette Cayedito. Authorities have little reasonable hope that she is still alive and fear the likelihood of finding answers about her disappearance may have died with the death of her mother Penny in 1999.

Many believe the mother who lived near the Mother Road knew more than she told.

Anthonette Cayedito

Penny Cayedito and her three daughters, Anthonette, eight-year-old Sadie, and five-year-old Wendy, lived in a small house just off Route 66 in Gallup. Penny was separated from the girls’ father. Some sources say his name is Larry Estrada, but others identify him as Anthony Montoya.

Penny had hired a babysitter to watch the children as she went with friends to the Talk of the Town bar on the evening of April 5, 1986. She returned home at midnight and said she went to bed soon thereafter.

At approximately 3:30 a.m., on April 6, Penny, Anthonette, and Sadie were awakened by a knock on their door. The girls did not recognize the man outside and returned to bed without answering the door.

Penny Cayedito

Anthonette’s Mother

When Penny, Sadie, and Wendy, awoke at approximately 7:00 on the morning of April 6, they were surprised that Anthonette was not in the apartment. Surprise soon gave way to concern and then to fear.

None of the Cayeditos’ friends or neighbors had seen Anthonette that morning. They searched the area but found no sign of her. The police were called and also mounted a search, but they too came up empty.

A neighbor recalled seeing an older model brown truck with New Mexico license plates parked outside the Cayedito home between 6:30 and 7:00. A man had exited the truck and walked towards the house, but the neighbor was paying little attention and could not describe the man or the truck in detail. Neither was ever located.

A man named Roger said it was he who had knocked on the door earlier that morning, saying he wished to check on Penny after they argued at the bar. After no one answered the door, Roger said he left and spent the night at the home of a friend who lived nearby. Penny confirmed the argument at the bar, the neighbor corroborated Roger had stayed with him, and he was cleared of involvement in Anthonette’s disappearance.

No Anthonette

Two subsequent sightings were reported of Anthonette in San Antonio, Texas, eight-hundred-fifty miles southeast of Gallup. On April 8, two days after her disappearance, a girl in a pink dress resembling her was seen with a blond-haired woman on the side of the road. Eleven days later, a woman believes she saw Anthonette in a brown truck at a Thriftway gas station. As the truck drove out, the woman believed she heard the girl screaming “Help Me!”

Six weeks later, on June 30, a man believes he saw Anthonette in El Paso, Texas, five-hundred fifty miles west of San Antonio, and three-hundred-eighty miles southeast of Gallup. A young girl had a mole on her cheek similar to Anthonette’s and was wearing a pink dress as was reported in the first sighting of the girl in San Antonio.

These sightings were deemed credible, but the girl could not be confirmed as Anthonette Cayedito.

Reported Sightings In Texas

One year later, the Gallup Police Department received a call from what sounded like a young girl. In a cautious and timid tone, she said “I’m–I’m Anthonette Cayedito! I’m Anthonette—I’m Anthonette Cayedito! I’m in Albuquerque.”

The police operator asked her where in Albuquerque she was. Before the girl could answer, the operator heard a man, in an angry voice, saying “Who said you could use the phone?” The girl was then heard screaming along with sounds of a scuffle before the line went dead. The call lasted forty seconds and could not be traced.

After listening to the tape, Penny believed the girl’s voice was Anthonette’s, but she did not recognize the man’s voice.

A search of the Albuquerque area, one-hundred forty miles southeast of Gallup, found no evidence that Anthonette was in the city.

 

Audio Of The Phone Call

In 1991, five years after Anthonette disappeared, the FBI released two computer-aged photographs showing how she may have looked at age fourteen. Four months later, a possible sighting of her was reported in Carson City, Nevada, eight-hundred-sixty miles north of Gallup.

A waitress recalled serving a rumpled adult male, a female, and a young girl appearing to be in her early to mid-teens. The waitress believed, in hindsight, that the girl was asking her for help, as she repeatedly and purposefully dropped her utensils on the floor and squeezed the waitress’ hand when she put them back on the table.

As she was cleaning the table after the trio left the restaurant, the waitress found a note written on a napkin beneath the plate where the young girl had eaten. It read “Help Me! Call Police.” The waitress did so, but police were unable to locate the girl or her companions.

It cannot be confirmed or ruled out whether the girl was Anthonette. I did not find any source stating the name of the waitress who believes she saw Anthonette or the name of the restaurant.

Computer-Aged Images Of Anthonette To Age Fourteen

One month later, police re-interviewed Anthonette’s younger sister Wendy, who was five-years-old when her sister disappeared. Now ten-years-old, Wendy told them she heard a knock on the door at approximately 3:00 on the morning of April 6, 1986, believed to be approximately half-an-hour before Roger had knocked on the door. Wendy then dropped a bombshell, saying she had witnessed her sister’s abduction.

Anthonette had also apparently heard the second knock as she answered the door.
All of the Cayedito children had been taught not to open the door to strangers. After Anthonette asked who was there, Wendy heard a man’s voice say “Uncle Joe.”

Immediately after her sister opened the door, Wendy says a man grabbed Anthonette and put his hand over her mouth. He and another man then dragged her to the back of a brown van, forced her inside, and sped away. Wendy did not see either of the men’s faces but believed one man was black and the other Hispanic. She had not alerted her mother because she believed the man at the door was her “Uncle Joe” Estrada, who was married to Penny’s sister. He was then re-questioned. After his alibi for the night and early morning of April 5-6 was corroborated, he was cleared of any involvement in his niece’s disappearance.

Wendy said she had not mentioned what she had seen because she feared people would think she was making it up. The latter contention seems odd, but she was only ten-years-old and could have still been traumatized and/or confused by the incident.

Penny, at that time, said she had not heard the knock and remained sleeping. Sadie, who had heard the other knock on the door, did not hear the second knock and is skeptical that it occurred.

The Cayedito Home

In the Navajo culture, it is common to consult Medicine Women in times of crisis. Penny Cayedito did so in 1992 hoping to learn what happened to her daughter. She said the medicine woman believed Anthonette was still alive at that time but being held against her will somewhere in the southwestern United States. She also believed Anthonette, who then would have been fifteen-years-old, had recently given birth. Nothing was found to support the medicine woman’s claims.

Penney is suspected of having some sort of involvement in her eldest daughter’s disappearance. She claimed to have heard the second knock on the door only after being re-interviewed by the FBI in 1994.

The FBI says Penny made near-incriminating statements that she had arranged Anthonette’s abduction, mentioning two men, Ronald and Emmanuel, as possible abductors. Ronald has been called Penny’s best friend, and Emmanuel, nicknamed Emo, had given flowers to Anthonette on three occasions in the weeks prior to her disappearance. Neither man has been publicly identified or charged.

Police wanted to re-question Penny in 1999, but she was ill with heart and liver problems and died before they could speak to her. Investigators believe she knew more about Anthonette’s abduction than what she had told them. Some sources say she had failed a polygraph test, but others say the results were inconclusive.

Penny often drank and is said to have developed an alcohol problem in the years after Anthonette’s disappearance. It has been rumored, but not confirmed, that she was also involved in selling drugs.

Was Penny Involved?

Newspapers give conflicting accounts as to who is Anthonette’s father. Articles published soon after her disappearance identify Larry Estrada as her father and Anthony Montoya as the father of Sadie and Wendy. More recent articles identify Anthony Montoya as Anthonette’s father.

I found a picture and obituary for a Larry Estrada who died in Gallup, New Mexico, in 2012. The obituary lists several survivors but does not mention any children or any relation to Joe Estrada.

I also found a death notice for Anthony Montoya who also died in 2012. He passed away in McKinley County, New Mexico, which includes Gallup.

Whether Anthonette’s father is Larry Estrada or Anthony Montoya, nothing I found suggested either was believed involved in her kidnapping.

Larry Estrada

Anthonette Christine Cayedito was abducted from her home in the early morning hours of April 6, 1986. At time of her disappearance, she was nine-years-old, four-feet-seven-inches tall, and weighed approximately fifty-five pounds. She was wearing a knee-length pink nightgown. She had black hair, brown eyes, and her ears were pierced. Anthonette had dark-colored moles on her right cheek, nose, back, and ankles and scars on her knees and on her mouth.

Anthonette Cayedito is Caucasian and Native American of Italian and Navajo descent. She would today be forty-seven-years-old.

If you have any information on the disappearance of Anthonette Cayedito, please contact the Gallup, New Mexico, Police Department at 505-863-9365, the FBI’s Albuquerque, New Mexico Field Office at (505) 889-1300, or the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678.)

Computer-Aged Image Of Anthonette Cayedito

On the evening of September 5, 1989, three-and-a-half years after Anthonette’s disappearance, Larry Estrada’s twenty-five-year-old mentally handicapped sister, Louisa, disappeared from Gallup following an evening walk. She was found safe in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, a month later.

I could not find anything more about Louisa’s disappearance, other than several blurbs in articles stating investigators do not believe her disappearance was related to Anthonette’s.

Louisa Estrada

SOURCES:

• Albuquerque Journal
• Charley Project
• Doe Network
• FBI
• Gallup (New Mexico) Sun
• NamUs
• National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
• Unsolved Mysteries