Abandoned Baby's Dad on the Run, May Face Rape Charges

A New York City cab driver says he was looking out for the baby's safety.

ByABC News
March 3, 2008, 1:40 PM

March 3, 2008 — -- A father who talked a cab driver into dropping his infant daughter off at a New York City firehouse is on the run, apparently fearing arrest because the baby's mother is only 14 years old, authorities said today.

Little Daniella, the 6-month-old girl who melted the heart of New York, is now being cared for by a city welfare agency. So is the teenage mother who abandoned her.

Still missing from this fractured family is Daniella's 27-year-old dad, Carlos Rodas. Rodas hasn't been seen since Feb. 29, when he talked cabbie Klever Sailema into taking Daniella to a firehouse.

Rodas almost certainly faces prosecution for statutory rape since the mother is under the age of consent. It is also possible that he could face charges of child endangerment.

Rodas' sister, Maria Siachivay, urged her brother today to stop running.

"Please turn yourself in. It's the best thing you can do," said Siavichay.

Siachivay, a waitress from Ecuador who is in the country illegally, and her cabbie boyfriend, Sailema, were drawn into a plot to abandon the baby, Siachivay said.

Sailema, at the request of Siachivay and Rodas, took little Daniella to a firehouse last week. There the driver claimed that a man had bolted from his cab and abandoned the baby in his back seat.

Sailema and Siachivay have been charged with filing a false report, and they emerged Monday to apologize to the city for lying.

"Publicly I would like to apologize, for making up something that didn't exist and wasn't fair," Sailema said through an interpreter. "My only purpose was to do the right thing."

With the help of a translator, Siavhicahy explained that her brother had given up the baby because he could no longer care for her. She said her brother had at least one previous brush with the law and, because his girlfriend was a minor, was afraid he would be arrested.

The teen mom apparently abandoned the baby with Rodas, and the father was unable to care for Daniella. Siavichay described how before leaving the baby with the cab driver, Rodas "hugged the baby, said 'Sorry, there's nothing else I can do for you,' kissed the baby and left crying."