Missing mom search continues

Investigators continued Tuesday to try to piece together what happened in the disappearance of a Carson City mother, whose toddler was found bleeding from a head wound at a grocery store in Dayton.

"We just aren't sure what's happened," said Sheriff Kenny Furlong. "We only know that the mother is gone."

Bertha Anguiano, 33, has been missing since Monday morning.

Furlong said Anguiano failed to open her video store, La Casita Video, on Woodside Drive after dropping off one child at school. Her 3-year-old son was found by Smith's store employees about 9:30 a.m. in Dayton.

"Nothing was out of the normal until she did not show up at work," the sheriff said Tuesday.

Furlong said the boy, who speaks mostly Spanish, has told police he and his mother were in the company of three men and his mother is dead.

What happened between dropping off her child at school and the toddler being found with a minor head injury in Dayton remains a mystery, he said.

"We are unable to determine a motive for abduction," Furlong said. "What sort of motive would cause somebody to take a woman away from her child?"

Anguiano's vehicle was found near the elementary school, but because her keys and purse were not in the unlocked vehicle, Furlong said investigators believe she left voluntarily.

An interview with the child Tuesday by a Spanish-speaking psychologist garnered more information, Furlong said, but he declined to release it.

Deputies were called in to watch the video store in the block of shops that anchor Desatoya and Edmonds drives, and others were sent into the community to interview family, friends and neighbors of the missing woman.

"From all immediate indications, this was a woman devoted to her family, her children and her business," Furlong said. "We're not getting very many leads."

The children are in the care of their father.