Is it time to start digging up their backyards looking for bodies?
by James J. Keene PhD
Editor's Note: This investigative report is my New Year's gift to my kidnapped children.
December 28, 2002 The Davis-Flores gang of Puerto Rico and New Jersey may have more than child kidnapping to worry about. After almost eight years of their participation in two counts of child abduction, now the author, the father of the kidnapped Keene kids, is wondering if that stink in the air from the Davis-Flores gang could really be the odor of two dead children. Let's look at recent events where we see that members of the Davis-Flores gang are "laying low" and the Keene kids have vanished -- Grace J. Keene, now 18, and James R. Keene, now 15.
On Feb. 1, 1995, Nilda M. Davis-Flores (then Nilda M. Keene) kidnapped Grace and James from their home. She and her nearly childless band of brothers and a sister have hidden and detained the children to this day. So we have an international child abduction, where the mother -- Nilda -- is the parental kidnapper and the rest of the Davis-Flores gang might be classified as just plain ordinary kidnappers. This was followed by state-to-state serial kidnapping within the U.S.
Late last year (November, 2001), my mother passed away, leaving an inheritance for her beloved grandchildren - Grace Keene and James Keene - the missing kidnapped kids. My brother as executor of our mother's estate failed in numerous attempts to contact the children or to locate them through communications to individual Davis-Flores relatives.
So where are my children? Now the Davis-Flores gang can't even locate them? Really? Why not? They took them and have been hiding them. Or are they just lying or continuing a cover-up of dastardly deeds? A common reason for any particular cover-up is that one and all involved are "guilty as hell."
There also may be other reasons. One may be the acknowledged cocaine trafficking (and probably worse) of at least one brother in the Davis-Flores gang, as stated by Nilda Davis-Flores herself. Then, there are the long-standing ties of the Davis-Flores clan with the Popular Democratic Party (PDP) in Puerto Rico, whose candidate is now Governor. Or there is their participation at very high levels in former PDP governments of Puerto Rico. Another cover-up factor may be that a certain prominent lawyer with PDP affiliations was visited by the kidnapper within hours of the kidnapping itself.
This lawyer, known as Lucita, is a long-term friend of the kidnapper -- from college days at the University of Puerto Rico, and was later elected as a PDP representative to the legislature of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. In spite of this friendship, Lucita called the police to have the kidnapper with victim children in tow removed from her house and carted away in a police car. What happened that disturbed Lucita so much? If a parent has to be removed from the premises by police, would not Lucita or the police contact the other parent? They did not. Why not? Did the police neglect their obvious duty to contact the father of the children they were taking away from Lucita's home because Lucita was a prominent lawyer? Did Lucita realize that she herself might be seen as a participant in an international child abduction?
Or maybe we have to think of the worst possibility of all -- that the demented Davis-Flores gang may have "disposed of" the kidnapped children. It would be preferable to not consider this possibility at all, but statistics show that this is within the range of outcomes in such cases.
Why has this whole gang not been arrested or at least questioned by authorities? Do their high political ties allow them to act with impunity? Two children last seen by them disappear and ... nothing? Maybe those political connections were stronger than I thought.
Were the kidnapped children rebelling from their oppression at the hands of the Davis-Flores gang? Were the children becoming a liability for their cover-up? Or was it just that the children became so messed up by their tragic victimization by the Davis-Flores gang that the gang decided that the kidnapped children are "proving" the well-known effect -- that abduction, detention and false imprisonment can have terrible mental and emotional fallout for the victim children. In this case, we have the unthinkable -- that the children are themselves evidence of the crime and most go.
Now as the story continues, my concern for the welfare of my children rises.
So the kids' uncle continued efforts to inform my children of their inheritance. I provided phone numbers and addresses [Press Release #2] of the brothers and sisters Davis-Flores. My brother sent registered letters and made phone calls. None of the letters were answered. In one phone call, Pedro Davis-Flores of Willingboro, NJ, disavowed any knowledge of the whereabouts of the children.
There is that stench in the air, again. If one thing is true of the Davis-Flores gang, it is that they know where each other are. This is much the same as in any family. I always had the address and phone of my parents, and they always had my address and phone number. Same with my brothers. Nothing unusual about that. Consider that family ties among Puerto Ricans are often said to be even stronger on the average than for mainland Americans.
In other words, Pedro Davis-Flores seems to be lying. But why? What is he hiding? Would not a cash inheritance come in handy for a college-age 18-year-old (my daughter, Grace) or a growing 15-year-old (my son, James)?
First, we look closer at brother Pedro, and then focus on other Davis-Flores gang members.
After the Davis-Flores gang stonewalled my brother regarding his responsibility to disperse the inheritance to my children, I tried another approach. Through Internet research, I found that the names "James and Grace Keene" were featured on the web site of the Burlington County Library, NJ. This is just a stone throw away from Willingboro, NJ, where Pedro resides. Sure enough, the web site described an art exhibit by my children, described as coming from Puerto Rico. It was them! And during April, 2002.
My brother, clever man that he is, also discovered that Nilda M. Keene had a phone number at the same address as Pedro Davis-Flores. What? The number was unlisted, but I have it, (609) 871-8390. Now the Willingboro police should obtain the telephone company records to establish the dates when this listing for Nilda M. Keene was in effect. Was it in the same period that the children had their art exhibit? This was the period in which my brother obtained the phone listing information. Would this prove that Pedro was lying?
Unless Mr. Pedro Davis-Flores starts talking, the Willingboro Police or the FBI should take an earth mover over to 29 Neptune Lane and start digging up Pedro's back yard looking for bodies.
This Davis-Flores brother is clearly a suspect and participant in the kidnap plot. He is retired military and it is said he was in military intelligence in Germany during his career. Since then he has worked for the New Jersey State Government in Trenton, NJ. I do not know if he is retired from that now. Like many of the Davis-Flores gang, to all appearances, this is a decent, honorable person.
But below the surface is the fuel for deception in this Keene kids case. He married a woman with a kidney ailment and wound up childless. Are my kidnapped children the children he always wanted and now has taken? I wonder. If he really loved children, one might think that he, like other childless Davis-Flores siblings, could have adopted children. He did not. None of them did, to my knowledge. Now he remains as one of the active participants in the kidnap gang, as he was right from the beginning in 1995. In fact, in July of 1995, the kidnappers fled Puerto Rico in one of a number of "serial kidnappings" across state lines -- to go where? They were later located at the older brother's house at 29 Neptune Lane in Willingboro, NJ.
Law enforcement agencies and investigative reporters should be on his doorstep every day until he starts talking. If not, police forensics should dig up his back yard.
On the other hand, it could be that Congress has amended the law to specifically exempt the Davis-Flores gang from parental and regular kidnapping statutes.
Since my kind and patient brother could not locate my children for the inheritance or even just to inform them of the passing of their beloved grandmother, I tried another approach.
The Davis-Flores communications blackout was still in effect. The kidnapped children could neither send nor receive messages by any means with their father or the Keene side of their family. Therefore, I thought I would send my children gifts delivered to the Pedro Davis-Flores residence.
By email, I ordered a very nice "gift basket" from one company and an equally pretty floral arrangement from another. Both companies did personal home delivery in an area including Willingboro. I asked each company to put a short message from "Dad" that I wrote in a sealed envelop: "To: James and Grace Keene; From: a library art fan." My hope was that the children might not be prevented from receiving my gifts and notes, since it might appear that the sender was an "art fan" having seen their recent art exhibition at the Burlington County Library, NJ. Recall that the Davis-Flores crew had also already rebuffed my brother regarding the inheritance for the children. Thus, I didn't want the Keene name on the envelope.
By now, the reader might easily guess what happened. Pedro denied any knowledge of the whereabouts of my children to both delivery persons. These denials were in person, in one case, and by phone, in the other. By standard practice, the florist had left the flowers with a neighbor and later called to confirm receipt. The distraught proprietor of the gift basket company emailed to me this sad result. Even this total stranger was mystified and saddened by the apparent fact that Pedro did not know where his own sister went. Incidentally, if she had taken a plane flight, it would have likely been Pedro who drove her to the Philadelphia airport.
One delivery person reported that the man -- Pedro -- said that "the children are no longer here" and that he didn't know where they went. Both agree that Pedro could or would give no forwarding address so they could deliver their gifts. Thus, he admits the children were in his house, but wants us to believe that he, as "loving uncle," has no idea where his sister or her children went? Not even a hint. Do you know any uncles like that? I don't.
Further, to my brother as executor of my mother's estate, who has every legitimate reason to contact my children, Pedro would not even say that the children were there, but have gone. It seems that Pedro is a man with several different versions of the truth. Were my children actually being "held" at Pedro's house at the exact time he spoke with my brother by phone?
Travel and other records may be necessary to establish this. Where are the police?
I then asked the gift basket lady to Fed Express the gift basket to Ana Davis-Flores in Patillas, PR. It was expensive, but worth a try. Ana is the childless sister of Nilda and co-kidnapper from the beginning [Fabulous Cast of Characters]. Her house was a "last known location" for the children. Further, it was certain to me that Ana would know where her sister Nilda and therefore the children were. My note included my email address as well as the URL to this web site. To date, no reply has been received.
Then, there is brother Jose Antonio "Che" Davis-Flores who is the only other known living sibling to have his own children. "Che" is an economist and worked -- and may still work -- in the Puerto Rico Deparment of Treasury. "Che" was in charge of investing large sums of money of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in the markets to earn income while the money remained undispersed for government expenses.
It is known that the kidnapped children have visited his house and played with the children of "Che" Davis-Flores. Why did not he or his banker wife contact me, the father? How could they not know that his kidnapper sister was involved in wrong-doing? With access to so much government money to invest, could "Che" have helped along the way to pay off police and courts in this case? It does appear that I was denied basic constitutional rights in the Superior Court of Guayama, PR. We may never know. He is not talking.
When we say "gang," there is no joke. Yes, another brother is Luis Davis-Flores, who once served in the cabinet as Secretary of a major Department -- I think it was Treasury-- of a former PDP Governor of Puerto Rico. It seems that Luis also studied economics and later became an attorney. According to the National Spiritual Assembly (NSA) of the Baha'is of the Commonwealth of Dominica, where the first of the serial kidnappings took place, Mr. Luis Davis-Flores was a participant in the kidnapping insofar as he reportedly acted as the "contact person" during initial negotiations between the NSA and kidnappers (Nilda and Ana), who were at a "hidden" location. Luis also provided transportation to the kidnappers on the night of the kidnapping. We will soon fill in other aspects of his new career as participant in child kidnapping.
And we cannot leave out Paul Davis-Flores, brother and next-door neighbor of gang member Ana Davis-Flores. When Paul is not busy lying to whoever asks about my children, his favorite pasttimes appear to be drinking alcoholic beverages and pretending that he has defects related to military service which justify a VA pension, perhaps used in part to pay for the booze.
Investigating some of the Davis-Flores cousins may also be productive. For example, Migdoel Vazquez-Davis, M.D., appears to be willing to sacrifice his medical career to be a faithful helper of this kidnapping adventure. Dr. Migdoel Vazquez-Davis has several backyards, including his own Hospital Lafayette. When both Nilda and my children needed proper medical attention soon after the abduction, there is strong evidence that cousin Dr. Vazquez-Davis could not get much of anything right. Maybe now he will talk. The police should find out.
Now, none of these people seem to know where my children are. How foolish of us to expect kidnappers to remember where they put the bodies.
So, alive or dead, where are my children? Isn't it about time for someone to seriously question the Davis-Flores gang? If they don't talk and cannot produce living children that are definitely identified as my children, then somebody should start digging up all of their backyards, for starters.
Copyright © 2002 James J. Keene
Original Publication: December 28, 2002
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