OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) – An Oakland woman is celebrating after decades of perseverance helped her family be reunited with her uncle, who was abducted from a West Oakland park in 1951.

Luis Armando Albino was 6 years old and playing with his older brother Roger in an Oakland park on February 21, 1951. On that fateful day, a woman lured Albino out of the park and promised the boy in Spanish that she would buy him candy.

The woman kidnapped him, took him to the east coast and raised him there.

Now, more than seventy years later, Albino has been found with the help of an online ancestry test, old photographs and newspaper clippings.

Albino’s niece, Alida Alequin, told KTVU that her uncle remains missing despite efforts by Oakland police and the FBI.

His family never gave up the search.

Determined to find him, the 63-year-old got his big break when he took a DNA test online “just for fun” in 2020 and matched a man on the East Coast.

The test showed a 22 percent match with a man who eventually turned out to be her uncle. A further search at that point yielded no answers or any reaction from him, she said.

“My daughter found a lot of pictures of this man and we started comparing them. The resemblance was so great; how much he looked like my other uncles. And then another picture where he looked so much like my grandmother, that made me shudder and I thought, ‘There’s something there,'” Alequin said.

Albino, father and grandfather, is a retired firefighter and Marine Corps veteran who served in Vietnam, according to Alequin.

Alequin told KTVU that her uncle “gave me a big hug and said, ‘Thank you for finding me,’ and gave me a kiss on the cheek.”

“There were just hugs and tears, lots of hugs and tears… It was beautiful,” she said.

Albino remained missing for more than 70 years, but he was always in his family’s hearts and his photo hung in relatives’ homes, his niece said. His mother died in 2005, but she never gave up hope that her son was alive and would be found.

Luis Armando Albino (right) with his late brother Roger (left). Luis Armando Albino was 6 years old when he was abducted while playing in an Oakland park in 1951. Now, more than seven decades later, Albino has been found thanks to the help of an online ancestor.

“I think she’s honestly happy, she was there guiding me too,” Alequin told KTVU of her late grandmother. “It’s just amazing how everything worked out.”

Albino was found on the East Coast and provided a DNA sample, as did his sister, Alequin’s mother. After finding Albino, they compared his DNA to that of Alequin’s mother and their uncle Roger and confirmed it was Luis, the family told KTVU.

Alequin was convinced he had a lead and passed this information on to the OPD, who in turn passed it on to the FBI.

Oakland police acknowledged that Alequin’s efforts “played a critical role in the search for her uncle” and that “we are all committed to the outcome of this story.”

Articles in the Oakland Tribune at the time said that police, soldiers from a local military base, the Coast Guard and other city employees were involved in a large-scale search for the missing boy. The articles also said that San Francisco Bay and other waterways were searched.

Investigators eventually agreed that the new lead was significant, and a new missing persons case was opened. Oakland police said last week that the missing persons case was closed, but they and the FBI consider the kidnapping an open investigation.\

His brother, Roger Albino, was questioned several times by investigators, but stuck to his statement that a woman wearing a headscarf had taken his brother away.

On June 24, with assistance from the FBI, Luis came to Oakland with members of his family and met with Alequin, her mother, and other relatives. The next day, Alequin drove her mother and her new uncle to Roger’s house in Stanislaus County, California.

“We didn’t start crying until the investigators had already left,” said Alequin. “I took my mother’s hands and said, ‘We found him.’ I was beside myself with joy.”

“They grabbed each other and hugged each other for a long time and really tightly. They sat down and just talked,” she said, talking about the day of the kidnapping, her military service and much more.

Luis returned to the east coast, but came back for three weeks in July. It was the last time he saw Roger, who died in August.

Alequin said her uncle and his brother Roger are working to make up for lost time.

Alequin said her uncle did not want to speak to the media.

“I was always determined to find him and who knows, maybe my story will help other families going through the same thing,” Alequin said. “I would say don’t give up.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.