Grieving father Robert Figaro yesterday appealed to the woman suspected of killing his only daughter, Jenice Figaro, to surrender to the police.
"Give yourself up," a weeping Figaro said during a telephone interview.
He said the police told him they had searched the places he told them she might be but had not been able to find her. The woman left Figaro's Corosal Road, Whiteland, home the night Jenice died and has not been seen since.
"There is no if, no buts, no maybe. This woman killed my child and I believe she should surrender to the police," Figaro said.
When the Guardian called the suspect's cell phone yesterday, however, a female relative answered and said she was in conference with her lawyers.
The photograph of a woman said to be a person of interest in the case was posted during the police crime watch show hosted by Inspector Roger Alexander, who appealed to the public for help in finding her.
Yesterday, Figaro recalled that the night four-year-old Jenice died, her tummy was swollen. He said when he left her asleep about an hour before, she was normal.
"I left her and one of the woman's daughters asleep. She wanted to wake up the children to feed them and I told her do not wake them up at that hour. She insisted and I spoke to her rough and told her not to wake them up. When I leave and gone she wake them up and one hour later I got a call that something was wrong, that my daughter was lying on the bed and she was not moving or breathing," Figaro said.
"I asked this woman to tell me what happen, why my child's stomach was so high. I begged her, I appealed to her to talk to me, tell me if it was an accident. She maintained her story that she fell ill while eating and later stopped breathing.
"But the evidence is overwhelming. She killed my child."
An autopsy showed the child died from blunt force trauma to the head and abdomen. She was buried at the Williamsville/Poonah cemetery on Thursday, following a service at the family's home.
As he tried to come to terms with the tragic situation yesterday, Figaro said he fell in love with the suspect and took her and her two daughters into his and Jenice's lives over one year ago.
"But I cannot face her now. I treated her like a queen because I wanted to set an example for her daughters and mine, that this is how a man is supposed to treat a woman," he said.
"Her children called me daddy and whenever I was around, I would have one on my back and two in my hands playing with them."
He said before she came into his life he trusted no one with his daughter.
"My daughter was my everything. I was taking care of her since she was ten months old. Anywhere I was going she was with me, her bag packed with cereal, milk, pampers, powder, everything and on my back and she in my arms."
He said whenever his relatives told him Jenice was being abused when he went to work, he would confront the woman, who always gave reasons for the marks on the child's body. He said he also questioned Jenice, who gave him the same explanation. At one point he said he took her to the doctor to get a medical examination and no signs of abuse were detected.