Andre's mother, Monique Rivera, had been taking Andre and her two older sons for a walk in their Brooklyn, New York neighborhood on March 28, 1989 when she encountered two women driving a 1988 or burgundy 1989 Pontiac Grand Am Sports Edition with tinted windows and possibly Maryland license plates. The women engaged Rivera in conversation about her children and asked to hold Andre, and they convinced her to go shopping with them. Then they took her home. She had planned to go shopping with them again. The woman called and asked her to come out and meet them. They insisted that she bring Andre with them on the shopping trip, so Rivera took the baby with her and left her other children. On the morning of March 30, Rivera's body was found in the woods by the Eastchester Bay, near City Island Road in the Bronx. There was no sign of Andre.