Yolanda Rivera’s case also was featured as a single-reel interview on an episode of Law & Order SVU titled “Missing 411.” The episode made it clear Rivera was not alive. Despite the fact that the case was not listed as a criminal investigation at the time of the episode, an official from the Nassau County Police Department informed the station that it was investigated, but was not an active case.

It is highly unclear how long Rivera may have been a free woman, though the coroner’s office said she may have been alive for months or even years.

Rivera was born in Queens in 1942 to a mother who was not a Jamaican native but a Cuban immigrant from the island.

Her father, Jose “Max” Rivera, had a tough upbringing and struggled to provide for his young child due to the family’s economic situation. His daughter was born as the result of a forced marriage.

“I was born right here [at the house on Central Avenue] in Queens,” Rivera recounted on “Law & Order,” describing her early childhood. “I had to go every month to go to work.”

On August 28, 1978, Max Rivera died in their Brooklyn home at the age of 26 on the morning of their daughter’s birthday, according to family and friends.

For nearly 20 years, Max Rivera’s mother and father had managed to live independently of the court system, according to Rivera. The state worked to help their income during those years.

In the early 1970s, Max Rivera married a woman who was undocumented and moved on, Rivera said. He became unemployed in 1977, Rivera said, because his wages were set based on the number of times his work certificate had been issued.

The woman Rivera married eventually remarried and had another daughter, then a son. Rivera said that in the late 1960s or early 1970s, the child was taken away from her mother after she was arrested for running away.

Rivera recalled that he learned that his daughter had been living in Haiti while he was away in the military. He was never notified.

Rivera said he visited his daughter in Puerto Rico in 1975 to thank her for her efforts in helping him find the man who had stolen his father’s pension. Max Rivera had gone to work when the man was recaptured and was found dead the following year.

“That was something I didn’t know,” Rivera said.