The city of Everman will name a new playground after after Noel Rodriguez-Alvarez, the 6-year-old boy who has been missing for months and is presumed dead by law enforcement.
Everman City Council unanimously approved the resolution Tuesday. The city received funding through Tarrant County this past year to pay for the construction of a playground at Clyde Pittman Park, according to a May 12 press release.
The playground will have special equipment meant for children with disabilities like Noel, who police say had an intellectual disability.
At Tuesday’s city council meeting, Everman city leaders said the park would also include the installation of a memorial plaque detailing Noel’s story.
"It's nice to see good things come out of a bad situation," Mayor Ray Richardson said at the meeting.
Everman police chief and city manager Craig Spencer said Whirlix, the company behind the park redesign, planned to add significant upgrades to the park, donate more than $47,000 in updates to park equipment and include a sign with Noel's picture on it.
But the playground would instead be named Noel Angel Alvarez Playground. Richardson recommended the name change after he said residents wanted the last name of Noel's mother, Cindy Rodriguez-Singh, to be omitted. Richardson said residents left Facebook comments saying she "doesn't deserve the recognition.”
Police believe Rodriguez-Singh may be involved in Noel’s disappearance and likely death. The local and federal investigation is ongoing, Spencer wrote in an email.
Noel was last seen at a hospital in October when his mother gave birth to twins, police said at a press conference last month.
Witnesses claimed Rodriguez-Singh had told them Noel was with his biological father in Mexico, with his aunt in Mexico or had been sold to a woman in a Fiesta Mart parking lot — but police said their investigation determined none of those stories were true.
Witnesses also told police Rodriguez-Singh was known by relatives to be abusive toward Noel. Witnesses reported Cindy calling her son "evil, possessed or having a demon in him," not wanting him near her other children, police said.
Law enforcement sent out an AMBER Alert for Noel on March 25, and he was labeled an “endangered missing person” later that day.
In November, Rodriguez-Singh applied for passports for herself and six of her children — excluding Noel, police said. Investigators wrote in a press release they later learned her husband Arshdeep Singh stole $10,000 cash from one of his places of employment in order to buy plane tickets to India for himself, Rodriguez-Singh and her kids on March 22.
The investigation also led law enforcement to believe there was a shed outside the home where Noel lived that once contained human remains. A patio was built in the area where the shed once stood, police said.
If arrested, Noel's mother and stepfather could face felony charges for child endangerment and, in Singh's case, theft, according to police.
Got a tip? Email Toluwani Osibamowo at tosibamowo@kera.org. You can follow Toluwani on Twitter @tosibamowo.
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