***Residents in a Casilda neighborhood claim having seen a "black dwarf"*** 
They claim that it appears by night at the Candelaria canal, that it its black and that its body is covered by hair. 
 
CASILDA--The police crime blotter did not feature the usual felonies and misdemeanors that ocurred this past weekend in the city and in the rest of the department of Caseros. Rather, it featured a claim which mentioned the appearance of an alleged "black dwarf" in the Candelaria canal. 
 
The information was picked up with a certain degree of humour by the local media and gave rise to remarks of all sorts. However, residents from the Nueva Roma neighbohood, living in a zinc-roofed shanty town located on the edge of the "big ditch", as Casildans call the Candelaria canal, claim ahving seen "a little hairy black dwarf" a few nights ago. The diminutive creature did its best to frighten them or to at least mystify them. 
 
The police continues to investigate as long as their are doubts about the matter; to many it is "little more than foolishness", although there are those who believe in the phenomenon, basing themselves on old local legends regarding imps. 
 
"Since I heard my dog barking, I went outside with a flashlight to see what was going on. At first I didn’t see anything, but then I pointed to another section and I saw a small, hairy and black thing scurrying to climb over the edge of the canal. I couldn’t make it out very well because it was nighttime and very dark, " says a woman who allegedly witnessed the strange apparition. 
 
The young woman further claimed to have heard it making a sound "similar to a baby’s burping" and said she was very frightened. "We’re afraid because according to some legends there are imps who appear to steal babies, and there are many young ones in this neighborhood." 
 
A man allegedly saw the undersized nocturnal visitor "inside the canal and standing on some rocks". He also described it as "having a body entirely covered in hair." 
 
According to locals, the alleged black dwarf was first seen last Friday night, althought they say that it appeared elsewhere and that police were called in to survey the site, but found nothing. 
 
"There are wells that weren’t there before, but we don’t know if he [the dwarf] made them or if an animal is to blame, the fact is that this is very strange," observed another woman. "It had the size of a 3 or 4 year-old child and was all hairy. Here in the neighborhood a few of us have seen it, but when he hears that people are searching for him and making noise, he doesn’t appear." 
 
(Translation (C)2003 Scott Corrales, Institute of Hispanic Ufology (IHU). Special thanks to Christian Quintero, Planeta UFO).