A little boy who went missing in Florida two days ago was found in New York after a mystery couple dropped him off at St. Patrick's Cathedral in midtown.
New York city police said the child, Nathaniel Fons, 3, was dropped off at the Catholic church about 6:45 p.m. Tuesday night with a note to notify the Flagler County (Florida) Sheriff’s Office.
Archdiocese spokesman Joseph Zwilling told NBCNewYork that the church rector said a woman came up to the Fifth Avenue Cathedral's information desk and asked to see a priest. When she was told to go to the Parish house on 51st and Madison she apparently put the note in the child's pocket and left him there.
The church is working with the NYPD to review security cameras to see if there is any video of the incident, Zwilling said.
The boy was taken to Cornell Hospital in good condition. Authorities still have to figure out where to place little Nathaniel because both his mother and father were arrested in Florida on Sunday on counterfeiting charges.
In fact, that's how the local sheriff's office discovered he was missing in the first place.
Flagler County deputies figured out that Nathaniel missing after the mother, Erin Comeau, and her boyfriend, Christopher Michael Brandstter-Howell, tried to use a phony $100 bill at a service station.
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The gas station attendant told cops the couple fled in a recreational vehicle, and deputies later spotted the RV with Brandstter-Howell and Comeau inside -- along with about $5,000 in funny money. .
The RV itself had been reported stolen from New York City.
When pressed, Comeau told authorities that another couple had her son, authorities said. She told investigators the boy was traveling in another vehicle with a couple and their two sons. At first, she told investigators she wasn't worried about the boy, but investigators said she quickly changed her story and said she believed the pair had her son were running from the law, according to WESH NBC-Orlando.
Comeau claimed her son was with friends Eleanor Black, 29, and William Scott, 32, who are wanted in connection to the counterfeiting and the missing child case. Black and Scott were not located Tuesday, and no charges have yet been filed against them. It is unclear if they were the ones who dropped little Nathaniel off at St. Patrick's.
The Flagler County Sheriff's Office is taking the lead on the case, but the Secret Service is also involved because of the amount of counterfeit money.
