Investigators search for missing Mexican police commander

REYNOSA - City officials confirmed the disappearance Thursday of a police officer who went missing more than two weeks ago.

The family of Miguel Ángel Morales Ronquillo, a first commander in Reynosa's police department, filed a missing persons report with the Tamaulipas Attorney General's office last week.

But authorities had not revealed the case to the public until Thursday so as not to hinder the investigation, the Mexico City-based newspaper El Universal reported.

Morales, 44, a native of Ciudad Victoria, Tamps., initially disappeared Aug. 19, according to an ad seeking information that has run in local newspapers.

His wife, Vera Marisela Hernandez, told the Televisa news network that both her husband's cellular phones had been turned off for 15 days.

Co-workers in the Reynosa Police Department have also not heard from him in weeks and his office appears abandoned.

"We are concerned about not knowing where our partner is," Reynosa Public Safety Secretary Carlos Leal Amadeo López said in Spanish at a press conference Thursday.

"But we will wait until the attorney general's office presents their findings to decide if we will start our own investigation."

Compiled and translated from El Universal reports by Monitor staff writer Jeremy Roebuck.