SANTA ANA — The body of a 21-year-old Santa Ana woman was discovered in a truck in the downtown area of Tijuana, Mexico, authorities said Wednesday.

Rosa Alicia Rosales Soto was found early Tuesday in the back seat of a green truck parked on H Street, between Second and Third streets, according to a news release from Mexican authorities. Rosales exhibited signs of trauma to the head.

Her estranged husband, Daniel Rangel Lozano, 24, of Santa Ana, turned himself in to Mexican authorities on Tuesday, [N.S.: In Mexico, where there is not only no death penalty, but where he will likely get no more than a few years for a mere single murder, should he be convicted.]

Lozano told authorities he lived with his wife in Santa Ana, but they decided to go to Tijuana where he said they went to take their lives, according to El Mexicano newspaper.

On Friday night, Santa Ana police received a call from Rosales’ aunt in Chicago, who said she was concerned about her niece who was living in Santa Ana, Cpl. Anthony Bertagna said.

Rosales apparently called her aunt and said her husband was going to kill her and then hung up, Bertagna said.

Officers went to the woman’s home in the 2700 block of South Pacific Avenue, but residents told police the woman and her husband moved out two weeks ago, Bertagna said.

The following day, Rosales’ aunt called her brother in San Jose, who called police there and filed a missing persons report. On Monday, San Jose detectives got in touch with Santa Ana police and said the couple had two children — a 6-year-old girl and a 4-year-old boy - and were involved in a custody dispute, Bertagna said. [So, she had her first child when she was only 15 or 16, and her second child two years later? Yeah, that sounds like the typical behavior of a ”Santa Ana” woman. These Santa Ana folks get around, too–Santa Ana, San Jose, Chicago, Mexico. And they are quite competent at dealing with the police... when they want to.]

”There may have been domestic violence involved,” Bertagna said. [Ya think?!]

On Monday, Lozano’s parents went to the police department [which police department?] and said their son left his two children with them and had not returned, Bertagna said….

Santa Ana detectives reviewed video from the U.S.-Mexico crossing and spotted the truck crossing into Tijuana. They contacted Mexican authorities and asked them for help locating the truck.

Homicide detectives are trying to determine whether Rosales was kidnapped and killed here and then transported to Tijuana or if she was kidnapped, driven to Tijuana and killed there, Bertagna said…. Mexican authorities are conducting their own investigation. [Don’t hold your breath!]

….

[Santa Ana woman found dead in Tijuana by Denisse Salazar, The Orange County Register, June 22, 2011.]

Thanks to reader-researcher RC.