The remains of 9-year-old Aliahna Lemmon were found Monday, and the family friend with whom she had been staying while her mother recovered from the flu has been charged with murder in her death.
Aliahna's body was found less than a mile from her home in the Northway mobile home park near North Clinton Street and Diebold Road, Allen County Sheriff Ken Fries said at a news conference late Monday night.
Aliahna and her two sisters were staying with family friend Michael Plumadore, 39, for about a week because their mother had been sick and Aliahna's stepfather works at night and sleeps during the day.
Plumadore was arrested on a single charge of murder after being questioned by police Monday night, Fries said. He was to make an initial appearance in court this morning.
"It was a horrific crime, probably worse than you can imagine," Fries said.
Fries would not say how the girl died or what condition her body was in when police found her.
Missing children are usually found within a mile of where they were last seen, Fries said. Although he would not say where Aliahna's body was found, he said it was "much, much" closer than one mile away.
Plumadore did not confess to the killing, but he did indicate to police where they would find her body, Fries said.
FBI agents and task force officers from throughout northeast Indiana as well as agents from the FBI's Child Abduction Rapid Deployment Team assisted in the search, officials said. Fries said the search for Aliahna was continuous over the holiday weekend from the moment she was reported missing Friday night.
Plumadore and Aliahna's family live in separate homes in the Northway mobile home park.
Plumadore told police Friday that he left the three girls in his mobile home about 6 a.m. Friday and went to a gas station about a mile away to buy a cigar. Authorities have said the store's surveillance video shows him there about that time.
He said he smoked his cigar and went back to sleep about 6:30 a.m. He woke up about 10 a.m. when Aliahna's mother called. After that call, he realized the door to the home was unlocked and that Aliahna was gone. He said Aliahna's sisters, both 6 years old, told him that Aliahna had left with her mom.
Plumadore believed them, so he locked the door and went back to sleep until about 1:30 p.m.
He said that when he woke up, he and the two other girls went about their day until about 8:30 p.m. That's when he talked to Aliahna's mom and learned that Aliahna was not with her, and authorities were notified.
Monday evening, hours before the sheriff's news conference, more than 100 people attended a candlelight vigil across the street from the trailer park.
Some of those at the vigil went out searching for Aliahna after the vigil.
David Story, the girl's stepgrandfather, said immediately following the vigil that investigators hadn't given him information about the search or its progress.
As Story spoke to the media, a woman passed along a teddy bear from one of Aliahna's classmates. Tears welled in the corner of his eyes and Story whispered, "Thank you."
"This was a child with the face of an angel," Story said. "She truly believed everybody had good in them, it just had to be found."
As news that some registered 15 sex offenders live in the mobile home park circulated over the weekend, at least one family was moving out of the park.
A moving truck was pulled up next to the door of a trailer and the man, who didn't give his name, said he'd lived in the park with his family about four months.
Police interviewed the sex offenders living in the mobile home park, and they were not suspects in Aliahna's disappearance, Fries said Saturday.
The trailer park has numerous vacant homes, some of which are boarded up.
Brandi Mossburg has lived in the park since September and said she doesn't plan to move.
She watched her two young children ride their bikes outside between a couple of trailers Monday, hours after police had searched their home and took police dogs around the outside of their home.
Mossburg said she would see Aliahna at the bus stop when Mossburg's son went to school.
One day at the bus stop, Mossburg said she rolled up Aliahna's pants because they were too long and she didn't want them getting wet.
"It's just a matter of keeping an eye on your kids," she said. "It put a damper on Christmas. We might not be in their family, but she was here."
And although Mossburg isn't afraid to let her kids play outside her trailer, she said she put a dresser in front of their window to prevent someone from snatching her kids through a bedroom window.
"I'm not going to be one of those parents that says 'I should've done,' " Mossburg said, her voice trailing off. "I try to take all the precautions."
