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Baby Hope's real name is Anjelica Castillo, and according to the man accused of killing her, her life was as bitter as it was short. She and her sister, Maribel, were given over to their father—Juárez's uncle—after he and their mother split. The father was unwilling to actually raise the girls, Juárez said, and showed up unannounced at the Astoria apartment of the defendant's sister Balvina Juárez Ramírez. A lamp factory employee in her 40s with no children of her own, Ramírez took the girls in, and no one in the family heard from the father again.According to court documents and Juárez, Ramírez's apartment was a hub for undocumented family members working low-wage jobs throughout the five boroughs. Uncles and cousins came and went, and children were dropped off and then gathered again after graveyard shifts were completed. Juárez would spend the night there on the occasions he had to be at his nearby job early the next day.The tip received by police centered on a woman who had a conversation with Baby Hope's sister and led to a series of interviews with family members—and then Juárez.After he was arrested in October 2013, two cops interrogated him with a Spanish-speaking detective serving as an interpreter. Initially, cops said, Juárez waived his right to silence and a lawyer, and no recording was made. Eventually, Melissa Mourges, the head of the cold case unit for the DA's office and current prosecutor for the case, joined the officers, and a camera was turned on. As James C. McKinley Jr.—who saw the videotaped confession in court—reported for the Times, Juárez "seemed confused. He initially said he did not want to talk, but then when he was shown the waiver to his right to silence he had signed earlier in the morning, he agreed to answer questions."
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