Body found during search for 2-year-old at center of Amber Alert in Waco

WACO, Texas -- Police found the body of a small child in a dumpster in Central Texas on Tuesday and they believe it could be a 2-year-old boy whose mother said disappeared from a park a day earlier.

Authorities in Waco issued a statewide Amber Alert Monday night for Frankie Gonzalez.

His mother reported to police Monday afternoon that she had taken Frankie to Cameron Park in Waco, about 100 miles (160 kilometers) south of Dallas. He was playing by a splash pad when she turned away briefly. When she looked back he was gone.

First responders searched the nearby Brazos River and used bloodhounds to search the park, but the hours long search came up empty.

Waco police Officer Garen Bynum told KWTX-TV that police found the body of a young child in a dumpster outside a church a couple of miles from the park around 8 a.m. Tuesday. Investigators believe the body is Frankie but won't be sure or know a cause of death until an autopsy has been completed, he said.

Police have not identified any suspects in the child's disappearance and death, but that it was "definitely a possibility" that Frankie was taken from the park, Bynum said.

Police were combing the scene for evidence Tuesday morning and have impounded the mother's car, he said. He declined to give more details, including what led police to the body in the dumpster.