Franchesca “Cheka” Alvarado had an invincible voice like Whitney Houston and the blistering humor of Roseanne Barr.
“Can you smell what The Rock is cooking?” she would bellow upon entering a room, an homage to her very public obsession with wrestler-turned-actor Dwayne Johnson. As a teenager, she plastered a photo of The Rock on her bedroom ceiling and swapped out his wife’s face for her own. One year, her family threw her a surprise birthday party, complete with a winking Rock cake.
The youngest of eight children, Franchesca was a stunner with jet-black curls cascading down her back and the kind of glowing skin where any makeup seemed superfluous. Yet she was refreshingly down-to-earth, preferring to make crafts over raucous parties and flashing a peace sign for the camera.
“That girl had no idea how beautiful she was,” remembered Franchesca’s older sister, Mia Casteing. “It was her aura, her energy.”
Franchesca was also a devoted single mom to her daughter, Janiah, who was born when Franchesca was just 18 and rarely took naps so the two could sleep in together each morning at their Hunting Park home. Janiah was a quick learner, thanks to Franchesca’s daily storytimes and improvised songs to help her baby remember the days of the week.
On St. Patrick’s Day in 2012, Franchesca secured a babysitter for her 3-year-old and accompanied an older male friend, Tracy Williams, to Atlantic City.
She had planned to let off some steam before registering for classes the following week at the Community College of Philadelphia. A fan of “America’s Most Wanted,” she had hoped to pursue criminal justice.
“Atlantic City to her was like Vegas,” Mia said, adding that her sister often took Janiah with her. “It was like the great escape. She felt like she was on the top of the world.”
Franchesca didn’t return home that night. Williams, who drove her down the Shore, told Philadelphia police that the pair split at some point in the evening and that Franchesca told him she would find her way back. She was last seen near the bright lights of Resorts and Borgata.
#TeamCheka, a collection of family and friends, sprang into action. They plastered the boardwalk with flyers, before police officers tore them down because they didn’t jibe with Atlantic City’s family-friendly image. They organized rallies where Janiah wore a T-shirt like a dress with the message, “Still missing, never losing hope.”
A Philadelphia Daily News cover demanded, “Where the hell is she?”
Fifteen months after Franchesca had disappeared, a fisherman found a severed foot at Corson’s Inlet State Park in Ocean City. The Adidas high-top sneaker was size 5½. Mia knew instantly; she hated those ugly sneakers. The toes still had traces of nail polish in Franchesca’s favorite glittery purple.
A year later, Franchesca’s tibia washed up. Her femur followed in 2015. Her right torso, with the tattoo of Janiah’s name, remained lost at sea.
Williams, who lived in Frankford, refused to submit to a lie detector test and Franchesca’s roommate at the time has declined to cooperate with investigators, according to Franchesca’s sisters. Franchesca’s former boyfriend is now in federal prison on separate gun charges. No charges have been filed in the 22-year-old’s death.
On April 4, 2016 — four years after Franchesca went missing — her family finally laid to rest her recovered bones, cradled in purple silk in a baby casket. Franchesca was buried on top of her mother, Valentina Amador, who died of liver disease when Franchesca was just 9 years old.
Franchesca had a difficult childhood. The year she was born, her father began serving life in prison. After her mother passed, Franchesca’s older sister, Christina “Tina” Ray adopted her and Mia. Tina was 20 years old at the time with two young sons. She is now raising Janiah, who randomly belts out high notes like her mom.
While attending Community Academy of Philadelphia Charter School, Franchesca was both creative and sporty, writing poems about her tight-knit family, playing volleyball and crawling in the dirt on Outward Bound wilderness trips.
She was everyone’s favorite secret keeper who lent an empathetic ear. Bubbly with a spicy personality, Franchesca decorated for every holiday on a budget, spelling out the birthday girl’s name in paper streamers.
She was the baby sister who slid into the role of big sister protector. Although she earned a modest living as a part-time supermarket clerk, Franchesca would buy Mia the five nicest things she could find at the dollar store, or bring Tina, who was married at the time, a dozen red-and-white roses for Valentine’s Day.
Franchesca “really was my life partner,” explained Mia, who raised her two girls alongside Franchesca and Janiah. “We realized that we were all we had and we just became a team. It was me and her against the world.”
Every Thanksgiving, TeamCheka heads to the Baptist church across from Resorts in Atlantic City to deliver food and clothing to the needy during Franchesca’s favorite time of the year.
The peel-and-stick Mickey Mouse decor from Franchesca’s last Christmas are holding strong on Tina’s front windows. The Minnie Mouse pajama set, which Tina had optimistically purchased for Franchesca during the first year she went missing, remains wrapped under the tree.
“If I let Janiah open it, I’m going to have to buy Cheka something else,” Tina said.
Occasionally, Janiah, now 11, will make a sad face when her nieces and nephews call out for their mothers.
That’s when Mia, who also lost her mother at a young age, grips the child’s hand.
“We’re in the special angels club,” she assures her.
Anyone with information about Franchesca’s case is asked to contact Detective Kevin Ruga of the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office at 609-462-2899 or Tina Ray at 267-241-9592.