A mother, a murder and MS-13

The string of text messages that would come to haunt Carlota Moran seemed like just an annoyance at first — an interruption to what was supposed to be a special outing for her and her son. It was the school break after Presidents Day in 2016, and Carlota had taken 15-year-old Miguel to the mall. Miguel walked with his arm slung around his mother’s shoulders as they returned a pair of pants at American Eagle.

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Every few minutes, Miguel’s phone pinged with messages. Carlota asked who kept texting him and he answered, with teenage vagueness, “Just a boy from school.”

Carlota was just over 5 feet, with thick black hair that fell midway down her back. At 5-foot-10, Miguel towered over her. As he tried on clothes in the dressing room, he teased her, “Why did you make me so handsome?”

The messages kept coming. They were from Alexander, a classmate of Miguel’s at Brentwood High School, and promised a taste of cool on a dull February afternoon. “Hey, let’s smoke up today,” Alexander wrote on Facebook Messenger.

Miguel agreed to join him, but not until later, and he wanted to bring a friend. “No, only us,” came the response. “That man Jairo is going to treat you. But just you, dog. I can pick you up. But just us.”

After lunch, Carlota dropped Miguel at a neighbor’s to play video games. Miguel and Alexander switched to Facebook voice messages. “Should I wait for you in the woods?” said Alexander, whose Facebook handle was Alexander Lokote, Spanish slang for Homeboy.

“No, better at my house — I don’t like to go out there in the trees,” Miguel said.

Miguel and Alexander argued about whether to meet at Miguel’s house or in the woods. Around 7 p.m., Miguel agreed to go to the patch of trees nearest his home, by the high school.

“Where are you? I’m here with Jairo,” Alexander said.

“Wait by the school,” Miguel replied.

“OK, come over. We’re just getting here now, by the fluorescent lights.”

See Carlota Moran tell the story in her own words.

Miguel walked off and vanished into the darkness. The only clue his family would have to where he had gone and what awaited him there were the 84 Facebook messages he had exchanged that day with Alexander. They were discovered, weeks later, by his teenage sister — not the police.

Miguel was the first of 11 high schoolers to go missing in Suffolk County in 2016 and 2017, as the street gang MS-13 preyed with increasing brutality on the Latino community. As student after student went missing, their immigrant families were stymied by the inaction and inadequate procedures of Suffolk County police, according to more than 100 interviews and thousands of pages of police reports, court records and documents obtained through freedom-of-information requests. Officers dismissed their children as runaways instead of crime victims and repeatedly failed to provide interpreters for witnesses and parents who spoke only Spanish.

Their experience points to a larger breakdown between the police department and Latino immigrants. Too often, Suffolk detectives acknowledge, police have stereotyped young immigrants as gang members and minimized their killings as “misdemeanor murder.”

Today, Suffolk police and the FBI are cracking down on MS-13. They’ve charged dozens of MS-13 members with felonies and the disappearances have mostly stopped. President Donald Trump visited Long Island and praised Suffolk police for doing a “spectacular” job against the gang, which he has made a national security priority.

The police department says it took the disappearances seriously and has improved relations with the Latino community. But Suffolk police gang squad head Lt. Tom Zagajeski acknowledged that, before the surge of attention, the department’s efforts to fight MS-13 fell short. “I think we’re a little more aware of things we didn’t pay that much attention to,” he told me.

For Miguel’s family and many others terrorized by MS-13, the police response came too late, and remains too little.

Carlota had been trying to protect Miguel since before he was born. When doctors in Ecuador said there was a problem with her placenta, she lay in bed for months. When her tiny baby arrived at 29 weeks, she slept next to his incubator.

She felt the pressure of being his sole defender; his father had left after he was born. Kids teased Miguel for being chubby, for his slight stutter, and for holding his mother’s hand long into elementary school. Carlota married an Ecuadorean who lived part of the year on Long Island, and then got green cards for Miguel and his sister Lady in 2014. The marriage didn’t last, but she made ends meet with her assembly line job at an envelope factory. She and her kids lived in a two-bedroom apartment in the majority-Latino community of Brentwood.

By 2016, Miguel and Lady were both enrolled at Brentwood High. Lady, a year ahead, brushed up against the gangs first. Boys wearing the blue plastic rosaries favored by MS-13 had pestered her to sit with them at lunch and smoke marijuana after class. But Lady was a natural loner. After a few months, the gang gave up. She worried that her soft little brother, a mama’s boy who still collected Beanie Babies and watched Disney cartoons, would be an easier target.

‘This is how you survive high school: Do not make friends with anyone.’ -Lady, Miguel’s sister

“I told him, ‘This is how you survive high school: Do not make friends with anyone,’” Lady said.

Carlota had heard about gang problems at Brentwood High. But when Miguel mentioned that some classmates were hassling him, she just gave standard parent advice to ignore the bullies. She was happy when he started going to meet friends by the high school. She loved how confident he was becoming. He was lifting weights. He had a girlfriend and got along well with Carlota’s boyfriend, Abraham Chaparro, whom he called his stepfather.

She was pleased that he wanted to spend part of his winter break with her. After dropping him off to play video games that Friday, she picked up chicken and rice for dinner. When she got home, she texted Miguel to ask where he was. She sent a third, a fourth, a fifth message, each time telling herself that he hadn’t heard the first few dings. 

By midnight, Carlota’s stomach was clenched with dread. Miguel never went more than a few hours without calling her. He never missed his 10 o’clock curfew. At 2 a.m., she got in the car and started driving, to the high school, the soccer fields, to bars that Miguel was too young to get into. “I was looking and looking, and the hours were passing so slowly. I was all alone in the dark out there, and it felt like my world was ending. I was so scared I would never see my boy again,” she told me.

When she ran out of places to look, Carlota came home and paced in front of the house, peering into the darkness. Then, she sat fully clothed on her bed, waiting for the sun to come up so she could go to the police station and report Miguel missing.

The door to the Bay Shore station was locked, so Carlota rang to be buzzed in. An officer greeted Carlota and asked what he could do for her. The station faced a Latino church, a Central American grocery and a pupusa restaurant, but few detectives there spoke Spanish.

Carlota didn’t know much English, so she brought along her boyfriend, Abraham. She tried to explain that her son would never run off; he couldn’t even handle sleepovers. The officer told Abraham there was no reason to panic. Most likely, Miguel was with his new high school friends. “They’re probably hanging out in New York City,” Abraham remembers the officer saying.

 

The New York City Police Department has a checklist of things officers must do if a minor goes missing, including speaking with the kid’s friends, checking social media accounts and putting out a press release. Nassau County has an even more extensive protocol that includes alerting state officials within two hours of taking a report. The Suffolk County police handbook requires one step: Search the area.

If police thought Miguel had been abducted and was in danger, they could have asked for a statewide alert. But state records show the police department never made the request.

The next day, Lady and a friend searched the woods, with a pet dog for protection. Venturing deep among the bare trees, they found no sign of Miguel. Carlota went through his things, looking in vain for some clue.

A Spanish-speaking detective was assigned to the case. Det. Luis Perez had served in the Air Force before joining the police department in the 1990s. He led other officers in searching the area around the house and Miguel’s room.

When classes started again on Monday, Lady worried about leaving her mother alone, but Carlota insisted she go to school. When Abraham got off work, they drove around together, scanning the streets.

Three days had passed since Miguel went missing, and police now sent out a press release. It said, “Detectives do not believe there is foul play involved.” The department listed Miguel as a runaway in the state missing person database, even though a spokesman said its policy is to assume missing children are in danger unless they have been thrown out by their parents or have a history of leaving home. Police generally spend less time and resources finding teenagers who leave home voluntarily. “As soon as you use the word ‘runaway,’ it’s a non-incident. It’s a non-crime,” said Vernon Geberth, a former New York City homicide detective who wrote a widely-used police investigative textbook.

Perez and the police department declined to comment on Miguel’s case. The department also declined to provide the missing person report to me or Miguel’s family, citing an open investigation. The department said that it conducts every missing-person investigation thoroughly and follows up on all leads.

“Our response to a reported missing person does not differ based on nationality,” it said, later adding, “Suffolk County Police officers are among the finest in the country and treat everyone with professionalism and compassion.”

Carlota started watching the news obsessively, and MS-13 kept coming up. Founded in Los Angeles in the 1980s, MS-13 is relatively small nationwide but has been active for years on Long Island.

‘What I worry about most is, it could be the gangs.’ -Carlota Moran, Miguel’s mother

Five days after Miguel went missing, Carlota got a local Spanish-language Univision TV reporter to film a segment about the case. Her face shiny with tears, she confessed the possibility she had begun playing and replaying in her mind: “There’s so much you can never be sure of in this country. What I worry about most is, it could be the gangs.” Reporter Alex Roland nodded sympathetically but later told me he thought Miguel had probably run away. After all, he explained, that’s what the police said.

The department hadn’t made a missing poster for Miguel, so Carlota photocopied his freshman ID and wrote next to it in Spanish, “If anyone sees this boy, please call his mother.” She posted the flyer at delis, churches and Miguel’s favorite clothing store, American Eagle. Tips flowed in: Miguel was eating empanadas, begging outside the 7-Eleven, getting a haircut. Each tip spurred an agonizing cycle of emotions: hurt and confusion that Miguel hadn’t let her know he was safe, then desperate hope, and finally despair as the leads proved false.

In early April 2016, almost two months after Miguel went missing, Lady discovered he had left his Facebook account open on Abraham’s phone. Most of his messages were failed attempts to talk to girls. Then, on the day he disappeared — the 84 text and voice messages with Alexander. Carlota and Abraham say they went to Perez with the phone immediately. He kept it for a few days, and then called and invited them to the high school to speak with Alexander. Assistant principal Lisa Rodriguez called Lady out of class over the intercom and had her wait outside the principal’s office as the adults talked to the student who had coaxed Miguel out.

Carlota and Abraham recall Alexander saying he and his friends had planned to go with Miguel to some train tracks, but Miguel never showed up. Carlota started crying. She demanded to be told where her son was. Alexander said he didn’t know. “I knew right away this was something key, and I was begging Perez to press for more,” Carlota said. “I was telling them, ‘He has to know where my baby is.’” After they dismissed Alexander, Perez and the assistant principal told Carlota they thought he knew more than he let on, but there was not much officials could do about it.

A spokesman for the Brentwood schools declined to discuss the meeting but said the district fully cooperates with police. Rodriguez said she couldn’t remember who Alexander was. “I work with a lot of kids, it’s a large building, so I can’t even tell you,” she said.

At the end of April, police asked the state for a missing person poster. It said, “Miguel is a runaway.”

Carlota fell into a routine of watching the news, paging through mystery thrillers at the library, asking Perez for updates and making the rounds of places where she had already searched. She thought about counseling but dreaded the likely advice: accept that Miguel might be gone.

It was the height of spring — three months since Miguel had gone missing — when Carlota saw something on TV that brought her up short: Another mother, crying over a missing son. Oscar Acosta was weeks away from graduating high school when he left home and never came back. He had told his mother a gang was bothering him because he had refused to join. Carlota needed to talk to her.

A nephew of Abraham’s recognized the mother’s house on TV. Carlota knocked on the door, heart hammering. The mother, Maria Arias, didn’t speak English. She told Carlota a familiar story: Detectives had reassured her that her son was hanging out with friends and would return after the weekend. Since then, Carlota recalled, Maria said she had been going to the police station and leaving without information because of the language barrier. Maria later told me that she had to enlist a woman from church to help her report Oscar missing.

Most Brentwood residents speak Spanish. But in 2016, three people in the entire 3,800-person Suffolk County Police Department had passed a language test to interpret for Spanish speakers. The department says it now has 10 interpreters. The New York City Police Department — 14 times Suffolk’s size — has 250 times as many certified interpreters.

‘The sense is that these kids are killing each other.’ -Ken Bombace, retired Suffolk police detective

The U.S. Department of Justice, which has been supervising the Suffolk police department since 2011, found this year that Suffolk officers are still not consistently using professional interpreters.

Current and former Suffolk detectives told me they didn’t see MS-13 as a public safety threat because its victims are usually at least on the fringe of gang life. They have a phrase for these killings: “misdemeanor murder.”

“The sense is that these kids are killing each other,” said Ken Bombace, who investigated MS-13 murders as a Suffolk County detective before leaving the department three years ago. 

In June 2016, a third immigrant teenager went missing from his home. His mother, Sara Hernandez, said she had pulled him out of Brentwood High because MS-13 was bullying him there. Since nobody spoke Spanish at the police station, Sara had to pay her cabdriver to interpret. She said police told her that her son could be hanging out with friends and would soon return.

Through the summer, Carlota struggled to maintain her belief that Miguel was alive. Hoping to find a piece of his clothing or some other hint, she took to walking at dusk through an area of shaggy oak and pine trees that police called “the killing fields.” At the heart of these woods loomed a boarded-up brick building, part of the abandoned Pilgrim State Psychiatric Center. Carlota was spooked by the empty spray paint cans and candy wrappers in the brush and wondered who had left them there.

She was always sure to leave by nightfall. “For the first time in my life, I was afraid of the dark.”

Carlota continued to check in with Perez weekly. One day, he invited the whole family to the station. Carlota hoped he was going to give them some news, but also dreaded what it might be. Instead, the family said, he accused them of knowing more than they were letting on. He spoke to Abraham in English, saying it was the language of the United States, and had him interpret.

A different immigrant family that met with police in 2016 about gang threats toward their daughter secretly recorded their interaction with Perez after he was brought in to interpret between them and another detective. Perez is not a certified interpreter, and in the video, instead of speaking in Spanish, Perez asks the daughter if she is bilingual and, even as her father protests that he can’t understand, begins interrogating her in English. “You think we’re as dumb as the kids you hang out with? You think this is all a joke?” Perez says.

In their conversation with Perez, Carlota and Lady insisted that they didn’t know anything more. What the detective said next stands out in the memories of all three family members. Perez turned to Carlota and told her, “If you’re so worried, go pay a fortuneteller to find Miguel.”

Perez didn’t respond to the two dozen questions I emailed him. When I called him, he hung up. When I knocked on the door of his home, he told me to get off his property.

In September 2016, Carlota tracked down another Univision reporter, who agreed to tape a segment outside the high school. He asked Carlota where she thought her son might be, but the producer cut in. Two girls from Brentwood High, Kayla Cuevas and Nisa Mickens, had been attacked as they walked near their homes. Nisa had been killed in the street. Kayla ran into a patch of woods and was missing overnight. Police had told state officials she was a runaway. Now her body had been found.

This case was different. The victims were native-born U.S. citizens, girls, and the gang hadn’t even tried to hide their bodies. “That’s not misdemeanor murder,” said retired Suffolk gang detective Rob Trotta, now a county lawmaker.

The murders made national news. The Suffolk County Police Department posted signs offering a reward for help catching the killers. Officers went door-to-door asking for tips. Police arrested dozens of suspected MS-13 members, mapped out the local MS-13 cliques, and searched the woods with German shepherds and shovels.

Zagajeski, the Suffolk gang squad head, said the girls’ murders spurred police to pay more attention to reports of missing Latino teenagers. “Where in the past we may have been like, ‘Oh, a missing girl, we hear this all the time,’ now it’s like, ‘Oh, a missing girl in Brentwood? There’s a lot of gang members over there, let’s take a ride over and see what it is,’” he told me. 

On Sept. 21, 2016, Lady was watching coverage of the hunt for the girls’ killers when an alert flashed. Police were identifying a body found days earlier in the woods as missing high school student Oscar Acosta. Carlota raced in from her bedroom and saw footage of police walking along the edge of the same killing fields she had searched with Abraham. Then the announcer said a second body had been discovered. Carlota noticed two men in suits walking down the stairs to her door. Her legs began to wobble. They were from the FBI, and had brought an interpreter to tell Carlota what she had already figured out from the TV: The second body was Miguel’s. 

Two days later, Carlota woke up in a hospital bed. The trauma staff had written on her chart, “Altered mental state. Patient unable to answer questions. Patient repeatedly stating ‘Just kill me. My son, my son.’”

Perez called Abraham to say he was sorry for the family’s loss. Soon after Carlota was released from the hospital, the body of the third missing Brentwood High student was found in the killing fields.

In all the months of uncertainty, Miguel’s clothes and stuffed animals had comforted Carlota. Now she packed them into five trash bags and put them on the street next to piles of fall leaves.

The coroner listed the cause of Miguel’s death as a blow to the head, and his place of death as a road. He had likely been killed the night he went missing. Abraham chose not to translate the forensic report that said Miguel’s bones were crisscrossed with long machete marks.

The police were paying more attention now, but the slaughter continued. In October, another 15-year-old, Javier Castillo, vanished and was listed with the state as a runaway, only to be found buried in the woods a year later. A man’s corpse was left in the street. A bystander was shot at a deli. At the peak of the violence, MS-13 murders accounted for 40 percent of Suffolk County homicides.

In April 2017, the gang left four boys in a gruesome tableau in the woods, bringing the murder count to 18.

Of the Suffolk County families who lost children to the gang during the rampage, nine have told me they felt ignored and disrespected at times by police. Most say they had to look for their kids themselves and struggled to communicate with police, and at least four saw their children listed as runaways before their bodies were found.

“The police treated me like I just had some rebellious kid on my hands, and meanwhile I was living the worst year of my life,” said Santos Castillo, Javier’s father.

As the head of the Suffolk County Police Department from January 2016 until he became district attorney early this year, Timothy Sini was responsible for handling the crisis. He said in an interview that, even though police had listed Miguel as a runaway, they had immediately suspected a homicide.

Sini acknowledged that police increased their efforts after the two girls were murdered, seven months after Miguel disappeared. “If you want to criticize the Suffolk County Police Department for not doing enough against MS-13” before then, “I suppose you can do that,” he said.

He called the phrase “misdemeanor murder” offensive and said it has taken time to change the police department’s culture. “We need to do as much as possible to eradicate MS-13 and will continue to do that. Any victim that has been murdered or injured, that is a tragedy,” he said.

MS-13 violence has largely subsided. Federal prosecutors have indicted suspects in about half of the MS-13 murders. But Miguel’s case has continued to stump investigators.

I spoke with two teenagers who said they had not been questioned by police about Miguel but knew who had killed him: Jairo Saenz, a leader of the MS-13 clique known as the Sailors. Federal prosecutors have charged him with killing six other people, including the two girls and Oscar Acosta. Jairo has pleaded not guilty. On the day Miguel disappeared, Alexander’s messages had kept talking about “that man Jairo.”

Henry, a Brentwood High MS-13 member who has given information to the police, told me the gang saw Miguel as overly friendly and effeminate. He also confused the Sailors. He didn’t seem to have gang friends, but he sometimes came to school wearing the red bandanna of the Bloods, the rosary of MS-13, or the head-to-toe black of the 18th Street Gang. Henry thought Miguel was just trying to look cool, but MS-13 members started circulating photos of him on a group text.

Henry said that at Jairo’s order, he grilled Miguel about how he dressed. Jairo listened in on speaker phone as Miguel said he didn’t owe anyone an explanation. After the Sailors killed Miguel, Henry said, some members went back, unearthed the body, cut apart his limbs and swung a machete into his face.

Jairo’s ex-girlfriend, nicknamed Chinita, also linked him to the murder. Chinita told me that, soon after Miguel disappeared, Jairo texted her that he was in the woods playing with human teeth. He sent her a photo of a dirty pair of black sweatpants like the ones Miguel wore the night he vanished.

Carlota and Abraham no longer haunt the killing fields, but they’re still looking for answers. One afternoon this summer, Abraham shuffled through his collection of worn business cards, trying the numbers of different detectives. Their apartment remained a shrine to Miguel. Carlota kept the urn of his ashes on Lady’s nightstand, nestled among some of Miguel’s Beanie Babies, several Bibles open to passages about fiery justice and a now-deflated Mylar balloon he bought for her for Valentine’s Day the week he disappeared.

Abraham got through to the Suffolk County homicide detective who now has Miguel’s case. He put the call on speaker phone so I could hear.

“We’re still working on it, us and the FBI. We are still trying to find out what happened,” the detective said.

Abraham asked about Alexander. What was his full name?

“That was one of the kids who was spoken to. I’d have to look in the folder and see what his name is,” the detective answered. “Everybody that we had a name of, we spoke to, and they didn’t really provide any usable information at this time. Unfortunately, sometimes these things take a long time.”

The last time I went to see Carlota, she and Abraham were in the middle of looking for a new apartment. She had decided to stay on Long Island until someone was charged with Miguel’s murder, but she was hoping to move to Nassau County. Carlota is feeling especially scared these days, after Kayla Cuevas’ mother was killed this month. She was run into by an SUV just before a memorial service for her daughter after getting into an argument with the driver.

‘If Miguel was an American, they might have found him right away.’ -Carlota Moran, Miguel’s mother

“You get the sense that the police here have this attitude that we Latinos are just killing each other,” she said. “If Miguel was an American, they might have found him right away.”

Even though they haven’t found a place yet, Carlota has begun sorting things into boxes. The detectives’ cards she kept safe in a drawer, to avoid losing them in the mess of the move. When she’s ready to leave, she’ll pack them up last, just in case.

With Bryce Love and the key parts of Stanford’s offense back, the Cardinal figured to be dynamic on that side of the ball.

Two games into the season, the defense showed it’s capable of leading the way, as well.

Joey Alfieri and crew helped harass talented freshman quarterback JT Daniels into four sacks and three turnovers and the 10th-ranked Cardinal held No. 17 Southern California to its fewest points in more than two decades in a 17-3 victory Saturday night.

“That means we have an entire football team,” quarterback K.J. Costello said. “I’ve being going against our defense a long time and I knew what these young guys were up to.”

Stanford (2-0, 1-0 Pac-12) has allowed just 13 points so far this season and has not given up a touchdown in the past seven quarters against San Diego State and USC (1-1, 0-1).

That kind of performance means the Cardinal haven’t had to rely on big plays from Love to win. Love did bounce back from a 29-yard performance in the opener by rushing for 136 yards and a touchdown.

His 28-yard run sparked the opening drive that ended with his 6-yard score. He added a 59-yard run in the third quarter to set up a field goal.

“When he gets into a rhythm everyone else is better,” coach David Shaw said. “When people try to stop him, we can make plays all over the place.”

The defense did the rest, holding USC to its fewest points since being shut out by Washington in 1997.

Stanford took control of the game late in the second quarter with a strip sack on fourth down against Daniels that set up K.J. Costello’s 9-yard touchdown pass to Colby Parkinson that gave Stanford a 14-0 lead.

Daniels made an impressive debut last week for the Trojans (1-1, 0-1) when he threw for 282 yards and a touchdown against UNLV. But duplicating that against Stanford proved far more difficult with the Cardinal using blitzes to pressure Daniels.

Daniels went 16 for 34 for 215 yards with interceptions by Malik Antoine on his final two passes of the night. He was forced to leave the game for one possession in the first half with a bruised hand after a hard hit by Joey Alfieri.

“He’s a very smart person and a very talented person and will grow from tonight,” USC coach Clay Helton said.

It was another big play by Alfieri that proved crucial late in the first half. Helton went for it on fourth-and-2 from the Cardinal 40, but Alfieri came free on a blitz and knocked the ball loose for Bobby Okereke to recover at the Stanford 49

“We have a saying around here that ‘there’s a party in the backfield,'” Shaw said. “I don’t think we were that team last year. I challenged them to be that team this year.”

The Cardinal drove down field to score on Costello’s TD pass with 34 seconds left in the half.

THE TAKEAWAY

USC: Daniels was sacked four times and pressured many more but still showed some promise at times. He connected on a well-thrown 45-yard deep pass to Michael Pittman to set up a field goal. He nearly had a TD on that drive but Amon-Ra St. Brown couldn’t come down inbounds with a pass in the end zone. Daniels also made an impressive escape on a near sack, turning it into 8-yard gain to convert a third down.

Stanford: Costello showed he can succeed, even in situations when the defense knows a pass is coming. He converted a long third down to Kaden Smith on the opening drive to help set up a touchdown. He then found Smith for 25 yards on third-and-23 in the third quarter to set up a field goal. He finished 6 for 8 for 76 yards on third down.

BLOWN CHANCES

The Trojans had plenty of chances to score but couldn’t deliver. They drove to at least the Cardinal 40 six times and ended up with just one field goal.

“We have to be able to push it in and get better,” Helton said.

BY THE NUMBERS

USC failed to score a TD for the third time in 25 years, having done it against Alabama in 2016 and Washington in 1997. The Cardinal held a ranked opponent to three points or fewer for the first time since beating No. 21 Penn State 24-3 in the 1993 Blockbuster bowl. Stanford allowed its fewest points against USC since a shutout in 1941.

INJURY

USC S Isaiah Pola-Mao left the game with a dislocated shoulder.

UP NEXT

USC: Visits Texas on Saturday.

Stanford: Host UC Davis on Saturday.

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Slowed by a sore knee, Aaron Rodgers picked up the pace behind center.

Remarkably, the two-time NFL MVP was more effective against the Chicago Bears after returning from what initially looked like a serious injury.

The hobbling quarterback threw three touchdown passes in the fourth quarter after returning from injury, and the Green Bay Packers overcame a 20-point deficit for a thrilling 24-23 win over the Bears on Sunday night.

Rodgers connected with receiver Randall Cobb for a catch-and-run through the secondary for a 75-yard touchdown and the go-ahead score with 2:13 left in the game.

“You’ve seen it time and time again. That guy’s a warrior,” Cobb said.

Rodgers was hurt in the second quarter after slipping to the turf while under pressure from linebacker Khalil Mack and defensive lineman Roy Robertson-Harris. The lineman landed on Rodgers, who grabbed the back of his left leg. He had ACL surgery on his left knee in college.

Rodgers was carted back to the locker room. Doctors determined he did not suffer a major injury and cleared him to return in the second half.

The Packers had to make a slight adjustment with their normally mobile quarterback limited to the pocket.

“Got to get the ball out. Can’t be moving around a whole lot back there,” Rodgers said. “And we did a good job mixing things up in the second half with some of our quicker-hitter stuff and actually some of our more vertical stuff, too.”

Rodgers also had touchdown passes to Geronimo Allison (39 yards) and Davante Adams (12 yards) in completing the rally from a 20-0 deficit with 9:14 to go in the third quarter.

Rodgers finished 20 of 30 for 286 yards, including 17 of 23 for 273 yards in the second half.

“Obviously, that’s a tough one for us. It stings,” coach Matt Nagy said after his Bears debut.

MACK ATTACK: A Chicago defense featuring newly acquired star linebacker Khalil Mack dominated until the third quarter. Mack had a 27-yard interception return for a touchdown against backup quarterback DeShone Kizer in the second. He had a strip-sack that led to another turnover. He had pressure in the backfield on a play in which Rodgers hurt his left knee.

This from a player who missed the entire preseason. The Bears acquired Mack last week in a trade with the Oakland Raiders.

“I prepared all offseason for the first game of the season and I wanted to … make an impact,” Mack said. “But you want to win these games. That’s the only thing on my mind. I hate losing.”

FAST START: An offensive-minded coach, Nagy had the aggressive Bears’ offense pushing the Packers around the field in the first half. Mitchell Trubisky was 23 of 35 for 171 yards. He also ran for 32 yards on seven carries, including a 2-yard touchdown run in the first quarter. It turned out to be the only offensive touchdown the Bears would score all night. The Packers’ defense, in new coordinator Mike Pettine’s first game, held the Bears to two field goals in the second half.

“You know we talked about finishing and we didn’t do that,” Nagy said.

COMEBACK COMPLETE: Nick Perry sacked the Bears’ Mitchell Trubisky on fourth-and-10 with 58 seconds to complete the comeback. It was memorable start to the Packers’ 100th season. Sunday marked the first time in franchise history that the Packers won after trailing by 17-plus points entering the fourth quarter, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

MORE RODGERS: Packers coach Mike McCarthy said he was prepared to go with Kizer to start the second half until getting the word from the team doctor in the tunnel.

“His performance speaks for itself,” McCarthy said.

Rodgers said he knee was swollen after the game. The Packers plan to run more tests on their QB on Monday, though Rodgers seems very optimistic to about his availability for next week’s game against Minnesota.

“No, I’m planning on playing,” Rodgers said.

OTHER DEBUTS: Chicago’s Allen Robinson had four catches for 61 yards on seven targets in his debut as the Bears’ top receiver. … TE Jimmy Graham had two catches for eight yards on four targets after joining the Packers as a free agent in the offseason from the Seattle Seahawks.

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With rain falling at Citi Field into the afternoon — and continuing throughout the Mets’ 6-4 win over the Phillies — the Mets scratched Jacob deGrom from his scheduled start Sunday, opting for a de facto bullpen day instead.

Hours before the first pitch, manager Mickey Callaway warned that with consistent rain expected, the Mets might make a late switch. The reason: They didn’t want to risk wasting deGrom, a leading candidate for the National League Cy Young Award, on a potentially rain-shortened start.

They made the call about 40 minutes before the scheduled 1:10 p.m. start time, which was delayed until 1:37 p.m.

“We knew we were going to get delayed and we knew the outlook wasn’t great,” Callaway said. “We talked internally about what we thought was best, and we approached Jacob about it and said, ‘Hey, there’s a good chance you could start this game, it could be one inning or two innings, and then we could get a long delay and probably [postponed] for the rest of the day.’ That was the forecast at the time. We got his input on everything as well.”

Callaway said the Mets would have made the same decision even if deGrom weren’t in pursuit of the Cy Young. He is scheduled to start Monday at Citi Field against the Marlins, and the one-day delay shouldn’t affect how many starts he makes the rest of the season. He still can have five more outings: Monday vs. Miami, Saturday at Boston, Sept. 20 at Washington, Sept. 25 vs. Atlanta and Sept. 30 vs. Miami.

By the way, rain is expected all day Monday.

As the teams played through a drizzle, Corey Oswalt got the start and allowed two runs — both on Rhys Hoskins’ line-drive homer in the first — in three innings. Of Oswalt’s nine major-league starts, this was his second in place of deGrom on short notice. He also got the ball June 29 in Miami when deGrom had to address a family issue.

Four Mets relievers — Drew Gagnon, Eric Hanhold, Drew Smith and Seth Lugo (save) — combined to allow two hits and two runs in six innings.

“They all knew they needed to be on alert from inning one,” Callaway said.

Oswalt was happy to make the spot start, especially if it was for the greater good of deGrom’s Cy Young chances.

“It’s been crazy — the stuff he’s doing, the numbers he’s putting up. Every time he goes out there, he’s dominating,” Oswalt said. “It’s been really fun to watch.”

The game turned in the fifth. Jeff McNeil had an RBI single to tie it and Michael Conforto (2-for-5) smacked a three-run home run to give the Mets a 5-2 lead.

McNeil had three hits for the second game in a row and for the fifth time in 44 career games. Conforto’s four RBIs tied his career high.

Even without their ace, the Mets (65-77) took the series rubber game from the Phillies (74-68), who are threatening to fall out of the NL East race. They are 4 1⁄2 games behind the Braves.

The Mets are 10-6 against Philadelphia, 19-24 against the rest of the division and 4-12 against the Braves. They have one more series to play spoiler against the Phillies, Sept. 17-19 in Philadelphia.

“We’ve obviously played well in the win-loss column, but they’re a big rivalry, I think our guys get pumped up to go play them and we play solid baseball against them,” Callaway said. ”We’ve gone out there and we’ve scrapped really hard against them every time we played them.”

SEATTLE – An afternoon’s worth of missed opportunities finally jumped up and bit the Yankees on Sunday.

And it helped send them to a rough 3-2 loss to the Mariners in front of 34,917 at Safeco Field.

“Disappointing, no question,” Aaron Boone said. “Just couldn’t get that hit to push us over. Chance to have a great weekend [but] a tough one here.”

The Yankees, who went 2-for-15 with runners in scoring position and stranded nine runners, were unable to complete a three-game sweep, leaving them at 3-3 on their nine-game trip.

In the battle for the first wild card, the Yankees had their lead over the A’s cut to 2 1/2 games, three in the loss column.

Dellin Betances, who worked out of a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the ninth inning Saturday night to earn a save, could not get out of trouble in the eighth Sunday.

With the score tied at 2-2, he walked Mitch Haniger on four pitches to start the inning. Haniger then stole second and reached third on Jean Segura’s sacrifice bunt.

With the infield in, Robinson Cano, who already had two hits, grounded to short. Adeiny Hechavarria had a play at home, but his throw was to the first-base side of the plate, giving Haniger just enough of an opening to brush the plate with his hand ahead of Austin Romine’s tag for the go-ahead run.

“I was a little out of whack to start,” Betances said. “I kind of gathered myself, but they played small ball and it worked out.”

Edwin Diaz pitched a scoreless ninth for his MLB-leading 54th save. The Yankees’ frustration boiled over when Brett Gardner took a borderline second strike – a ball call would have made it 3-and-1 – struck out swinging for the second out and was ejected by plate umpire Jeremie Rehak. It was Gardner’s fourth career ejection and first since 2014.

After Andrew McCutchen was hit by a pitch, Giancarlo Stanton hit a broken-bat flare to right. Haniger laid out and made a diving catch to end it.

“I don’t think I was the only one that took exception to it over the course of the game,” Gardner said of the strike zone. “I guess I was kind of the final straw. I guess he was probably tired of hearing guys get on him. I felt like that was a big pitch …frustrating, but I probably let my emotions get the best of me.”

CC Sabathia was solid, allowing two runs and seven hits in five innings-plus.

Sabathia struggled to find his cutter in the first inning and allowed four straight two-out singles by Cano, Nelson Cruz, Ryon Healy and Cameron Maybin that turned a 1-0 lead — courtesy of a bloop double by Stanton and a line-drive RBI double by Miguel Andujar — into a 2-1 deficit.

“Still leaving a lot over the plate. I need to make better pitches with that pitch,” Sabathia said of his cutter. “But after the first it got better.”

The nadir offensively for the Yankees came in the fourth, when they loaded the bases with none out but managed only one run that tied it at 2-2.

“Had them on the ropes there,” Boone said.

After singles by Neil Walker, Luke Voit and Gleyber Torres, Hechavarria struck out on three pitches and Gardner fouled to third on the first pitch. But with Erasmo Ramirez on the verge of escaping the jam unscathed, McCutchen laid off a full-count slider to work a walk, forcing home the tying run. Stanton grounded out to end the threat.

In his last 16 games, Stanton is 7-for-62 with 27 strikeouts. He struck out once Sunday after fanning at least twice in each of his previous seven games.

“We had quite a few opportunities,” Gardner said. “Obviously, myself, Hechy, a couple guys came up in some big spots and we just didn’t get the guys in. A frustrating day overall for us.”

If there is one thing the players who were with the Giants last year know about, it’s losing.

They became connoisseurs of defeat and, like sommeliers, they became able to detect the subtle differences in flavor. They know what it feels like, they know what it smells like, they know what it tastes like. They suffered through a year in which the team dropped 13 of its 16 games, most of them ugly and overmatched affairs.

But Sunday’s 20-15 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars in a soggy opener at MetLife Stadium presented a new bouquet. Not one that stunk of despair but instead had hints of optimism. The result for these new-look Giants with a new head coach may have been the same in the ledger that is the NFL’s standings, but it came with a different vibe in the postgame locker room.

Maybe it was the flash of promise from running back Saquon Barkley, whose 68-yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter gave a glimpse of things to come. Or the return of Odell Beckham Jr. from ankle surgery last October, as he made 11 catches for 111 yards and resumed his role as the go-to guy in the passing game. Or the way the Giants’ defense did not allow any offensive points to the Jaguars in the final 32:42 of the game and dominated the second half.

It never feels good to lose, but as tight end Evan Engram noted: “Our spirits are up. Definitely.”

Why?

“We battled,” Engram said. “We kept fighting. It’s encouraging to see us fight . . . We didn’t see that a lot last year. We’re close and we’re a lot better than we were last year. That’s why we feel encouraged.”

Eli Manning said he is “encouraged by the whole situation.”

“We can get things going and we can play at a high level,” the quarterback said. “We will make it work.”

The big offensive play the Giants were waiting for all game — and really for a number of years — came a little too late. After a sluggish start to his day, Barkley showed exactly why the Giants selected him with the second overall pick. He took a handoff up the middle, broke a tackle, cut to the outside and sprinted down the right sideline for the 68-yarder with 10:39 left in the fourth quarter.

The electrifying touchdown cut the Jaguars’ lead to 20-15 (Barkley was stopped on the ensuing two-point conversion run).

It was the kind of explosive play the Giants had been waiting for all game. Unfortunately for them, it came two snaps after the Jaguars had one of their own on defense. Manning’s pass was batted at the line of scrimmage by Abry Jones, intercepted by Myles Jack and returned for a 32-yard touchdown that made it 20-9 with 11:24 left in the fourth quarter.

That was the insurance the Jaguars needed to pad their lead to two scores. The Giants got the home run from Barkley but were never able to connect again.

Two opportunities for them came with Beckham earlier in the game and on either side of halftime.

On a second-and-12 play from the Jaguars’ 13 in the final seconds of the half, Manning was pressured up the middle and had to throw a floater and hope Beckham could reach it. He could not, and it fell incomplete with seven seconds left in the second quarter. Aldrick Rosas kicked a field goal to make it 13-6.

On second-and-10 from the 33 on the opening drive of the third quarter, Beckham was behind Jaguars cornerback Jalen Ramsey and open in the end zone, but Manning’s pass was slightly overthrown. It, too, fell incomplete. The Giants later settled for another field goal.

Was this a case of the quarterback and receiver being out of sync after nearly a year without game action together?

“We didn’t connect,” Pat Shurmur said, shrugging at those trying to find meaning from the missed passes. “There’s no Hunt for Red October there.”

The key is making sure this doesn’t become another Dead October. Eight days into the month last year, the Giants were 0-5 and their season was over.

“I’m certainly hugely disappointed that we lost for our fans and our ownership and for those players in the locker room,” Shurmur said. “I’m disappointed we lost, but there’s a lot of good in that locker room and they’re going to hang together. I really believe they will.”

“This is 0-1, that’s all it is,” safety Landon Collins said. “I’m confident that it’s not going to be an ongoing thing.”

Now, when the Giants play the Cowboys in Dallas on Sunday, they’ll see just how refined their senses are in distinguishing the subtle difference between losing a game and being losers.

DETROIT — Sam Darnold will make history Monday night, but he was drafted to rewrite Jets history.

A few generations of Jets fans don’t know what it’s like to see their team play in the Super Bowl. It’s been almost a full 50 years since Joe Namath delivered on his guarantee in Super Bowl III.

Darnold is only a rookie and he’s not that brash, but he does believe in himself and what he can do. “It’s going to be fun,” he said. “I know that we’re going to win football games. It’s going to be really fun for a long time here in New York.”

The Jets are Darnold’s team now. When the Jets open their season and the Darnold era against the Lions on Monday Night Football, he will be the youngest Week 1 starting quarterback since the 1970 NFL-AFL merger.

Darnold is the 14th quarterback to start for the Jets since 2002. He earned the trust of the organization, the coaching staff and his teammates by picking up the playbook quickly, learning from his mistakes, taking control of the huddle and making plays.

Receiver Jermaine Kearse, who is doubtful for the Detroit game with an abdominal injury, said Darnold’s composure and poise were the first things he noticed. Then Kearse paid Darnold an even bigger compliment, describing a play during the joint practice with the Redskins that really got his attention.

“I didn’t think he was throwing it to me and he literally hit me in the chest, and I had no choice but to catch it,” Kearse said. “He’s able to throw us open. That’s something special in a quarterback, something we’re looking forward to.” It should be a tough first game for Darnold, facing former Patriots defensive coordinator Matt Patricia in his head-coaching debut. The Lions are an aggressive defense that gave up the 10th-fewest passing touchdowns last year (21) and were third in the league in takeaways (32). Now rocket scientist Patricia is overseeing everything. Cornerback Darius Slay tied for the NFL lead with eight interceptions in 2017 and defensive end Ziggy Ansah registered 12 sacks. Darnold and the offensive line can expect to see a lot of pressure and different looks from Patricia’s defense. Let’s see how the rookie handles it. The Jets’ offensive line has been porous, but they believe they’re going to prove their critics wrong. The Jets have better skill players this season after signing running back Isaiah Crowell and receiver Terrelle Pryor and getting wideout Quincy Enunwa back after he missed all of last season with a neck injury. “Our receivers have a lot of respect for him for what he’s done so early in his career,” receivers coach Karl Dorrell said of Darnold. “He’s a very accurate thrower. I think they want to do the great things for him to get him comfortable in our offense. They believe in him. “Our job is just to make sure that we’re open, and when he’s making plays for us, we need to make those plays. We’re excited about this journey for him and we’re excited about what he’s going to be able to do to help us go further as an offense.” Todd Bowles believes in Darnold and his ability to give the Jets the best chance to win. Bowles chose Darnold over 39-year-old Josh McCown, who began his NFL career in 2002. That says a lot for a coach who has yet to lead the Jets to the playoffs in his three years in charge and finished 5-11 the past two seasons. The Jets’ future, as well as Bowles’, are in Darnold’s hands. “I’m starting him — my confidence level has got to be pretty high,” Bowles said. “It’s a team going up there. So I don’t worry about the confidence of the quarterback. I worry about the confidence of the team.” And how is that? “I’m fine with that,” Bowles said. “We’re good.” The Jets’ defense should be improved with the addition of cover cornerback Trumaine Johnson. But they will be without inside linebacker Josh Martin (concussion) and maybe second-year safety Marcus Maye (foot) against the Lions. They’ll also be without an edge rusher; that was a gaping hole that they have yet to fill. But the Jets believe they have enough to end a seven-year playoff drought, even though few outside of their locker room do. Progress is what Jets chairman and CEO Christopher Johnson wants to see from Bowles’ group this season. If Darnold stays healthy, improves and begins to develop into the franchise-leading quarterback he’s projected to be, that might constitute a successful year for the Jets. From there, general manager Mike Maccagnan would have to fill in the holes and improve the talent around Darnold. Then they could really be on the rise. For the Jets, this could be the start of a new era.