DALTON, Ga. — For more than nine years, Carolina Mingura waited in north Georgia and hoped for the return of her daughters, Brianna and Denice Jaquez. For more than nine years, she heard nothing. For more than nine years, she did not give up hope.

Last month, it paid off.

In June, Mingura heard from Jose Jaquez — the girls’ father and the man who Mingura said had taken their children from Murry County, Georgia, without explanation and without warning. He wanted her to come to Mexico and get them. He offered no explanation for why he had taken them and no reason why he was now sending them back to Georgia, she said.

In February 2008, Jaquez had the two for the weekend and was supposed to return them to Mingura. He never did. Brianna Jaquez was just 4. Denice Jaquez was 8.

Mingura, who now lives in Dalton, says Jaquez had done nothing to indicate he would be leaving, much less taking the girls. And when he contacted her earlier this year, saying he wanted her to have the girls back, he again offered no explanation. When she traveled to Mexico to get the girls, Jaquez did not even show up, she said. Instead, he sent his father to drop them off at the house of Mingura’s parents in Chihuahua, in the northwestern part of the country.

When the father reached out to say he was in Mexico and ready to return the children, Mingura said, “I was very surprised.”

“She was very happy,” said her sister Brissia Mingura, who was acting as a translator for the family.

Brianna Jaquez said she has very little memory of her life in Murray County.

“They remember a little English, a few words,” Brissia Mingura said. “But during their years in Mexico they lost most of their English.”

Brissia Mingura says there’s no evidence the girls were mistreated.

She said the family is currently working with local school systems to figure out what schools they will go to and what grades they will start in, a task made difficult by the fact they do not have their school records from Mexico.

Murray County Sheriff’s Office Detective Andy Dill says local law enforcement officials never stopped trying to find the children.

“We had a lot of support from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children,” he said, “but It’s very difficult when it involves another country.”

Both the father and the daughters were in law enforcement databases, and if they ever tried to cross the border back into the United States, they would have been detained, Dill said.

But he says they were fortunate that the father decided to return the daughters because, even if U.S. law enforcement had been able to find out where they were, they likely would have been unable to get them back even though the girls are U.S. citizens and the mother had legal custody of them.

“From what I know, Mexico would not help us get the children back,” he said.

He said Jaquez still has a warrant out for his arrest from Murray County for custodial interference and would be detained if he tries to re-enter the United States.

Oliver writes for the Dalton, Georgia Daily Citizen.