A Riverside County judge has sentenced 32-year-old Jake Mitchell Haro to a term that totals more than three decades in prison for killing his seven-month-old son, Emmanuel, bringing a grim conclusion to a case that began in August with a false abduction report and evolved into a homicide prosecution built on allegations of sustained child abuse. The court on Monday imposed consecutive punishments that include an indeterminate term of 25 years to life for child abuse causing death, additional time for prior offenses, and financial penalties, while authorities acknowledged that Emmanuel’s remains have still not been found. Prosecutors said the sentence reflects both the gravity of the baby’s death and Haro’s history of violence against children.
The sentencing took place at the Riverside Hall of Justice before Superior Court Judge Gary Polk. According to the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office, Polk identified the child-abuse-resulting-in-death count as the principal offence and ordered the 25-to-life term to be served after determinate time for other counts and prior matters. The DA’s published breakdown states Haro also received 180 days for filing a false police report, six years for a prior child-abuse case, and eight months for being a felon in possession of a firearm, with all terms to run consecutively, and was ordered to pay $10,000 in restitution. The Associated Press likewise reported that Polk first imposed seven years and two months for a probation violation and other charges, then added 25 years to life for assault on a child under eight, for a total that surpasses 30 years.
Haro had changed his plea last month, admitting guilt to second-degree murder, assault on a child under eight causing death, and filing a false report. Prosecutors emphasised that the plea was “to the court,” meaning there was no negotiated agreement on sentencing with their office; the judge retained full discretion in calculating the term. The DA said evidence indicates Emmanuel died after multiple acts of abuse and that a series of repeated assaults led to his death. As of the sentencing date, investigators have not recovered the baby’s body.
The case drew widespread attention in mid-August after Emmanuel’s mother, 41-year-old Rebecca Renee Haro, reported that her son had been abducted by a stranger outside a retail store on Yucaipa Boulevard. In that initial account to authorities, she said she was punched and rendered unconscious while changing the baby’s nappy, and that Emmanuel was gone when she came to. Detectives from the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department quickly signalled doubts, citing inconsistencies in the story and saying publicly they could not rule out foul play in the infant’s disappearance. Within days, after investigators confronted the couple and served search warrants, both parents were arrested and charged. The DA later charged them with murder; Jake Haro ultimately pleaded guilty, while Rebecca Haro has pleaded not guilty and remains in custody pending further court proceedings.
During Monday’s hearing, the court also addressed the financial components of the sentence. ABC News reported that the defence objected to imposing any fines or fees on the grounds that Haro is indigent and represented by a public defender, but the prosecution argued the defendant “deserves no leniency.” The court nevertheless included more than six years of consecutive determinate time for other crimes along with the life-term component, and the DA’s office confirmed a restitution order of $10,000 and 551 days of credit for time served.
The courtroom also heard victim-impact remarks. “He destroyed my family,” said Emmanuel’s maternal grandmother, Mary Beushausen. “Everybody in my family, all my children are destroyed by this.” In a further comment to the judge, she said: “I don’t want to give him another chance.” Her statement underscored the prosecution’s narrative that Emmanuel’s killing followed a pattern of violence rather than an isolated event, and it came as the DA’s office publicly reiterated that it will continue to pursue the case against the child’s mother.
Riverside County District Attorney Mike Hestrin, whose office has faced questions about the justice system’s handling of Haro’s earlier conduct, said in August that the defendant was an “experienced child abuser” who “should have gone to prison” years ago. Referring to a 2018 case involving Haro’s older daughter, Hestrin called the prior judge’s decision to grant probation “an outrageous error in judgment” and argued that if prison had been imposed then, “Emmanuel would be alive today.” On Monday, his office released a statement framing the disposition as partial accountability. “The lies told in this case only deepened the tragedy of Emmanuel’s death,” Hestrin said. “While today’s sentence represents a measure of accountability for Jake Haro, our office will continue to seek justice as the case against his co-defendant moves forward.”
Assistant District Attorney Brandon Smith, who prosecuted Haro and continues to lead the case against Rebecca Haro, wrote in a filing that will likely be cited as the state’s enduring assessment of the crime: “Jake Haro murdered seven-month-old Emmanuel but, in reality, he comes before this court having taken the lives of two young children. If there are lower forms of evil in this world, I am not aware of them.” In court materials and public statements, prosecutors have argued that the abduction narrative was fabricated to conceal abuse that had already led to the infant’s death, and that the subsequent community search, which drew volunteers and law enforcement into fields and roadside verges, was premised on a lie.
The timeline that investigators and prosecutors have laid out spans less than three months but is dense with developments. Emmanuel was reported missing around 7:47 p.m. on 14 August, with the mother telling deputies she had been attacked by an unknown male while standing near her vehicle and changing the baby. By the next day, the sheriff’s department announced that it could not corroborate the abduction tale and that the mother’s account contained contradictions. Over the following week, detectives obtained and analysed surveillance video and re-interviewed witnesses. On 22 August, the couple were taken into custody at their home in Cabazon; both were charged with murder four days later. Late in the month, amid continuing searches that included the use of cadaver dogs, local television cameras recorded Haro on the side of the 60 Freeway in Moreno Valley, in orange jail attire and accompanied by deputies—a scene that underscored both the scale of the investigation and the unresolved question of where Emmanuel’s remains might be.
The prosecution’s description of Emmanuel’s death centres on prolonged abuse, a theme that resonated with earlier court history. In 2018, Haro pleaded guilty to child endangerment for injuries inflicted on his then-10-month-old daughter; prosecutors say that child suffered severe, lasting harm and is bedridden. At the time, Haro received a six-year suspended state-prison term and probation—an outcome that has been revisited repeatedly since Emmanuel’s disappearance. In asking for a punishment of 31 years to life, Riverside County prosecutors pointed to that prior case to argue that probation failed to protect children in Haro’s care and that consecutive terms were warranted. Monday’s sentencing converted the 2018 suspended term into active time and added prison for the firearm offence, stacked behind the life-term portion.
Officials have not announced any recovery of remains. In August, authorities said they had a “pretty strong indication” of where the body might be, and noted at a press conference that they believed Emmanuel had been “severely abused over a period of time.” But searches to date have not located the infant. ABC News reported that Haro was ineligible for probation at sentencing because he was already on probation for the prior child abuse case, and that the court added more than six years of consecutive time for other offences. The DA’s office separately confirmed the consecutive structure and restitution order in its public release.
For now, the prosecution of the co-defendant proceeds on a separate track. The DA’s office says Rebecca Renee Haro maintains her not-guilty plea to murder and filing a false report and is being held on $1 million bail. She has a felony settlement conference set for 21 January, according to the DA’s published schedule. Because her case remains active, prosecutors say they will not comment further on either Haro’s plea and sentencing or the underlying investigation, beyond reiterating that Emmanuel’s remains have not been recovered and that they believe the baby died as a result of repeated assaults. rivcoda.org
Beyond the official record, the community’s sense of shock has been amplified by the contrast between the initial abduction alert—which drew volunteers and officers into a search area spanning shops, car parks and roadside embankments—and the subsequent allegations that there was no kidnapper at all. Local reporters at the time documented neighbours joining lines of deputies and search-and-rescue teams; by the end of the month, cameras had tracked Haro himself walking a scrubby verge as cadaver dogs worked the ground nearby. Though investigators have not said publicly what information led them to that stretch of the 60 Freeway, the images reinforced a grim narrative in which the most likely scenes were not stranger danger but the aftermath of domestic violence against an infant. CBS News+1
The sentence announced on Monday is unusual less for its length than for the way it is constructed to ensure Haro serves years before the life-term eligibility even begins. Prosecutors and the judge built the order with consecutive determinate time front-loaded ahead of the 25-to-life component, reflecting their view that distinct crimes—lying to police, violating probation, the prior child-abuse case, and the firearms conviction—should each carry a separate penalty. The DA’s release said Haro’s pleas were entered without a bargaining agreement and that the office will “continue to seek justice” as the remaining case moves forward. The AP’s account, which cited court filings, quoted Assistant District Attorney Brandon Smith’s description of Haro as someone who “comes before this court having taken the lives of two young children,” a reference to both Emmanuel and the catastrophic harm inflicted on his older daughter. rivcoda.org+1
As the formal proceedings closed, the open questions were the same ones that have haunted the case since August: where Emmanuel’s body is, and how precisely he died. The DA’s public statements say evidence supports that the baby was abused repeatedly and that those assaults caused his death, but investigators have not described any recovery of remains or a definitive timeline of the fatal injuries. Authorities have said in prior updates that they are confident Emmanuel did not survive and that they possess a strong indication of a potential location, though they have not shared details. For families and volunteers who rushed out in the early days to look for a kidnapped child, the realisation that the abduction narrative was a fiction will sit alongside the knowledge that the infant’s body remains missing. Emmanuel’s grandmother’s words—“He destroyed my family”—summed up the grief inside the courtroom, while the DA’s statement framed the disposition as accountability for a man they say should have been behind bars long before August. ABC News+1
In the immediate term, Haro leaves court with a punishment designed to keep him in state prison for decades, and with a record that prosecutors argue establishes a pattern of violence against his own children. The office that sought the maximum consecutive structure now turns to the remaining defendant, indicating it will say little publicly while those proceedings continue. The unresolved search for Emmanuel is likely to continue to draw attention, both because of what it may reveal about the final hours of the baby’s life and because it represents a missing link in a case that has, from the outset, forced investigators and the public to unwind a false story before they could begin to prove a fatal truth.