He had bailed out of jail and disappeared months ago, but Morales expected to see him again -- just not on her television set.
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Yet there he was last month on Univision. There was his face. There was his voice. There was Julio Cesar Nerio, the man charged with molesting her son.
He was lounging in a hammock, laughing and smiling for a television news crew in El Salvador. He was recounting his run-in with three Americans. They had tried to take him away, he said, and he didn't know why.
Morales knew why, and she wants everyone else to know, too. After months of silence, she decided to speak out because Nerio is being called a hero in his home country.
"The reason I'm doing this is because that animal in El Salvador is claiming to be the victim," Morales said at her Las Vegas home. "He's not the victim. My son is the victim."
Morales' dream of having a child did not come easily. It took her 13 years and seven miscarriages before he was born, and she swore to protect him.
She thought she was.
After Morales divorced her husband about five years ago, her son continued to live with her. When she went to work each day at 5 a.m., she would drop him off at her parents' home in North Las Vegas.
There, her son encountered Nerio. He was a family friend who did odd jobs at the grandparents' home in exchange for room and board.
On Feb. 8, Morales gave her son an early Valentine's Day card. It was titled, "I'll be there for you," and began with the words, "If you've got secrets you want to tell, we can talk all day long."
Morales' son read the card and cried. At first Morales thought he was touched, but she soon realized something was wrong. For years, her son had been carrying a painful secret. Nerio, he told her, had molested him.
"He told me, Mommy, if I ever told, he would burn my grandparents," Morales said.
Morales wanted to kill Nerio. She drove to his street and drove back and forth into the night. Eventually, she went to the police and filed a report.
North Las Vegas police arrested Nerio weeks later and charged him with multiple counts of lewdness with a minor under 14.
In the meantime, Morales said, she fantasized about killing Nerio. Maybe she would run him over with her car if she saw him in the street. Maybe she would lure him to her house and hit him in the head with a hammer.
"I'm not a bad person," she said, explaining her thoughts as those of an angry parent.
At the preliminary hearing, Morales heard the details for the first time when her son testified. Her son testified that Nerio raped him several times over two years.
She broke down and cried.
After the hearing, the case was bound for trial in District Court and bail was reduced from $90,000 to $45,000 because several charges were dropped.
Nerio's lawyer, Phillip Singer, said he planned to take the case to trial and argue that Nerio was innocent because he suffered from advanced diabetes and can't perform sexually.
"He knew he didn't do it, and he believed we could prove he didn't do it," Singer said.
The trial is in limbo until Nerio returns to Nevada. Singer said Nerio went to El Salvador because he has family there.
"I'd like to clear his name," Singer said. "But it's probably more beneficial for him to stay there and live out the rest of his life."
Nerio remained in jail until June 14, when his relatives put up their house as collateral for the $45,000 in bail. Two days later, he missed a court date, and a warrant was issued.
Dirty Deeds Bail Bonds co-owner Tim Deam, who posted Nerio's bond, was determined to find him. Deam and his partner, Robert Suckoll, worked with local authorities in El Salvador to find Nerio.
In mid-October, Suckoll, 34, and two employees of his pest control business, Mark Pruter, 22, and Erick Lippincott, 24, flew to the Central American country to get Nerio. With the help of local police, they found him within a few days and took him into custody.
When they got to the airport, however, the three Americans were arrested by El Salvadoran police and charged with depriving Nerio of his liberty and impersonating FBI agents. The Americans were put in jail. Nerio was set free.
After being held in jail for two weeks, the three Americans were put on house arrest last week. They still face criminal charges that could bring prison terms of three to six years.
Morales, who at first was angry at the bail bondsmen for freeing Nerio, now feels sorry them.
Her main concern, however, is seeing Nerio brought to justice. She is planning a trip to El Salvador later this month, and she plans to file charges against him there.
"He's going to have to pay one way or another," she said. "If he's here or over there, he's going to pay."
In the United States, prisoners charged with sex crimes against children are typically separated from the general population for their protection. In El Salvador, Morales said, they don't get the same protections.
"They'll do to him exactly what he did to the people he hurt," she said. "So if it was up to me, leave him there."
