Teen Applying To College Learns A Chilling Secret About His ‘Family’

Everything started with J.J Mangina’s college applications. When he punched in his social security number into an online portal, the number bizarrely didn’t register. This didn’t make any sense, although the answer would soon become shockingly clear.

J.J. contacted the school and explained his dilemma, which the school counselor agreed was incredibly peculiar. With the counselor helping to dig around a bit, he made a massive revelation.

The 18-year-old high school graduate eventually found his true social on the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children database. He had some serious questions.

The FBI was immediately notified about the events. The department handled missing persons cases of all kinds, and they were licking their lips when they received the call about J.J. Now, it was time to act.

The FBI did some research, and agents soon uncovered that J.J. Mangina was, in fact, living a lie. Their research indicated that he was a missing person. For answers, he needed to look to a small home in Alabama.

There, he would see the precious face of Julian Hernandez, who lived with his mother in Birmingham for most of his childhood. His parents were separated, but he still spent time with his father… which landed him in trouble.

Bobby Hernandez thought the world of his little Julian. Despite the troubles he had with his son’s mother, Bobby frequently saw Julian and often accompanied him to preschool. However, one August day in 2002, Bobby made a grave decision.

Like any other day, Bobby arrived at school ready to scoop up Julian. However, instead of doing what Julian’s mother expected her ex to do, Bobby packed Julian’s blanket and plush whale doll, and the two disappeared.

It took several hours for Julian’s mother to suspect any foul play occurred, but when her son never returned home, she phoned the police. Immediately posters were put up alerting the community to the incident.

Bobby never in his life showed any signs he was capable of kidnapping his own son. Sure, he loved him more than life itself, but he wasn’t a felon. Or, at least that’s what Julian’s mom thought.

Julian, on the other hand, was only five years old at the time and had no clue what his father did. For years, he lived his life under an assumed name. But, the house of cards eventually toppled.

As it turned out, J.J. Mangina was little Julian Hernandez thanks to a fake driver’s license Bobby acquired. When his father picked him up 13 years earlier in Alabama, the two fled to Cleveland and started over. In 2015, the situation was complicated.

Lt. Johnny Evans, a Birmingham police officer involved, said, “I’ve been doing this 25 years and it’s something I’ve never experienced before. We spent tireless hours doing everything we could to try to find him.” Bobby had to be arrested.

Bobby was immediately arrested and charged with kidnapping, custody interference, tampering with records and forgery. Even though Julian appeared to be thriving at the time of his discovery, harsh words were issued regarding Bobby’s persona.

According to Julian’s grandmother, his father was “angry, controlling, and vengeful. Bobby Hernandez kidnapped him because he wanted to get even with Julian’s mother for leaving him — this is not the sign of a good father.” Julian’s mother shared her own pain.

In an emotional statement issued by Julian’s mother, she wrote, “During my darkest moments I considered suicide. I wanted to die.” It also stated she refused to give up the search for as long as she was alive. Julian was put in an impossible situation.

He surprised the courtroom when he said about his father, “Even if other people can’t, I forgive him for what he’s done. I love him and I want him to be a part of my life.” After all, he just knew him as dad.

Even tough Julian pushed for his father to remain a free man, Bobby broke multiple laws and was sent to prison for four years after reaching a plea deal. There’s no telling if the he and his son will ever reconnect.

It’s normal for kids to put their parents on a pedestal, but, like in JJ’s case, as an adult you can learn something about their past that changes everything you thought you knew. Luckily, JJ learned another college student shared a similar experience, only she learned the ugly truth in front of her entire class!

In February 2018, 19-year-old Anya Hettich, a student at California State University in San Bernardino, was sitting in biology class when she found herself the audience to something she wasn’t remotely prepared for.

Sure, science class can be exciting… Students are given the opportunity to perform hands-on procedures that show them the wonders of all living organisms, how could it not be?

However much fun these classes might be, they’re certainly not known for their interpersonal drama. Of course, students like Anya are prepared for some physical danger, like getting burned by the Bunsen burner, but no one expects the heartbreak of deep, dark secrets revealed!

Initially, the subject matter seemed rather boring to Anya and the other students, especially since the class started at 8 a.m. Yet the lesson of the day had them all discussing blood types, and nobody predicted the turn of events that followed…

The class was learning about Punnett squares; simple diagrams named after pioneering geneticist Reginald Punnett. They’re used to help predict which genes may be passed from one organism to another.

As part of the lesson, the students in Anya’s biology class were discussing comparisons of their blood types (as these are genetically inherited traits) to that of their parents. This caused some concern for one of Anya’s classmates…

This particular woman discovered something that seemed like it must have been a mistake. Her mother’s blood type was A, and her father’s blood type was O. This meant that her AB blood type should have been impossible.

What followed was so dramatic that Anya couldn’t help but write about it on Twitter. “My prof [sic] explained that that’s impossible, that she’s confused on the blood types or something—she even drew out the different Punnett squares to show her.”

The professor was right: People with type A blood can only pass on the A blood type to their children. The same goes for type B. However, while people with type AB blood can pass on both type A and B, type O can pass neither.

In other words, since blood type O comes from a recessive gene, it was scientifically impossible for this young woman to have type AB blood if neither her mother nor her father carried blood type B.

Clearly, something was off, but she assumed the professor filled out her Punnet Square incorrectly. “The girl was persistent that she wasn’t wrong on the blood types, and was confident that there was something wrong with how the professor was doing it.”

The professor didn’t want to make the student any more uncomfortable. Could you imagine trying to move forward with your lesson plan after a student revealed to the whole class that the man she called her father was not who she thought he was?

Ultimately, the professor “told [the student] to talk to her parents to double check the blood types and make sure the information was correct.”

It wasn’t long before Anya’s classmate returned with shocking news. Anya was bewildered, so one could only imagine how her classmate must have felt! “…her mom had an affair with her husband’s brother who is his stepbrother,” Anya tweeted.

“So technically,” Anya continued, “she’s been raised by her uncle and not her dad her entire life—her mom hid it from the both of them for 21 years.” This had all the makings of a made-for-television movie!

That’s right, thanks to what should have been a simple class study, a young woman’s world was shattered. “Because my prof told her she was wrong with her blood types, she figured out her uncle was actually her dad and vice versa,” Anya reiterated.

Anya wrapped up her classmate’s story with a somewhat predictable, yet no less heartbreaking conclusion. The young woman’s mother and the man whom she thought was her biological father, were getting divorced.

Since the story was told second-hand it’s impossible to determine the details of what happened when her classmate confronted her parents with this information. One could only guess that it was a difficult pill to swallow!

While you can’t blame this young woman’s parents for making the surprisingly quick, yet painful decision to get a divorce, that doesn’t make the outcome any less heartbreaking. Take the story of Shanara Mobley, for example, who had to make her own gut-wrenching decision to get her family back.