Some people have visited This Black Sista’s Page and commented that they don’t trust Bradley Lockhart’s statements anymore, after I posted my article about the comments of Byron Coleman, Sr. (Lockhart’s father-in-law), Cheyenne Lockhart, and family friend Tim Allen about the nature of his relationship with Shaniya, as well as the previous death of his second wife through gun violence. Apparently by this time, even the family and extended family are split about who didn’t do what right. I will admit that Brad Lockhart certainly appears to look suspicious. Perhaps this is why Grace has gotten this “exclusive.” Maybe she smells something fishy, too. Well, tomorrow’s your chance to heat up HLN’s phones and ask those questions that definitely need answering.

The viewers’ phone line is 1-877-NANCY-01, or 1-877-626-2901.

Nancy Grace primetime exclusive! Shaniya Davis’ father, Bradley Lockhart, breaks his silence & discusses the heinous rape & murder of his 5-yr-old daughter. This as the murdered girl’s mother is transferred to another jail for her own safety; is she getting special treatment behind bars? Hear what the little girl’s father has to say about her mother, who police say sold her daughter for sex. Does Shaniya’s dad think the mom will be charged with murder? Taking your calls live — Nancy Grace has the latest, breaking developments in the case — only at 8 & 10 pm ET on HLN!

Understand that the live show will be on at 8 (Eastern), 7 (Central) and 5 Pacific) and the repeats on 10 p.m. There will be no live phone talk at 10 p.m.

I know I’ll be watching this segment, and taking some notes. You?

I have decided to revise my post about Haleigh Cummings.  I actually had these feelings about Misty yesterday but wondered if they were too far-fetched. Yet, the human soul of today’s youth is often dark and very capable of heinous crimes, so I have now chosen to post my true thoughts.

Was Misty Croslin jealous of Ronald Cummings’s affection and love for his daughter Haleigh? We all witnessed the deep pain that Ronald Cummings has expressed over the loss of his daughter Haleigh. Was Ronald’s seventeen year-old girlfriend envious of that love and bond with his child? –Enough to want to harm Haleigh? What happened after Haleigh’s disappearance? Misty got an engagement ring and a marriage to Ronald. All of a sudden Misty was the only female energy in the home and the only female getting Ronald’s attention.

Hey, it happens in incest cases all the time. It happened in my own case. My mother was jealous and angry over my sexual “relationship” (abuse) with my father. I’m not saying that Ronald was molesting Haleigh. Incest does not need to be involved for a loving bond between father and daughter to exist –a bond strong enough for the wife to resent it. This happens more than people understand. Many women get jealous of their daughters.

Look at Casey Anthony. Not only did she want the freedom to party but she was angry over her mother’s love and affection for Caylee, and we all know what happened to her. I don’t know what happened in Haleigh’s case, Misty might be innocent for all we know. This is just a theory that I am throwing out there.

I still feel that someone in Misty’s family, or anyone who was visiting Ronald Cumming’s home that night could be the perpetrator in this case. Misty Croslin’s father is being questioned about Haleigh’s disappearance, and Misty’s brother, Hank Croslin Jr., has also been questioned by police.

We may never know what happened to Haleigh but let’s not put aside the fact that ugly truths exist and Misty has not passed the polygraph.

HaLeigh Cummings (Family Photo)

I found June Bug, by Chris Fabry, because of a series of links while looking at books connected to other books I have purchased. I find this to be a good way to find books similar to others I enjoyed.

Description: June Bug, a nine year old girl who travels with her father in an RV, sees a missing child poster with her face on it.

3 3/4 Stars

Plot/Storyline: 2 1/2 Stars

With an interesting twist on the child abduction theme, June Bug is a watered-down tale of a girl who has been kidnapped, but never suspected it until she saw a “Missing Poster” with her face on it. This is a feel-good novel without much basis in reality when it comes to the main plot.

There are some very tense moments included that do keep the storyline rolling along. Also, the backstories for characters like the sheriff make for some interesting reading.

I really just had a problem with the main premise of the book. It’s hard to pinpoint without giving away spoilers. I can say that the actions taken by June Bug’s father both in the past and the present are simply unbelievable. The actions taken by Sheila, someone June Bug and her father meet in their travels, are also pretty far out there. Basically, one minute she is wondering if he is a child molestor or worse, then, just because she sees him teaching the kid to ride a bike, she decides he is the world’s most wonderful father, except for when she thinks that it is okay to give a lecture on how much the girl needs a mother, which, frankly, sounded like she was looking for a proposal.

There was an underlying message that a father could not raise a daughter alone. I found that to be a very sexist message to pass on in this day and age. The ending was so forced and unrealistic that I was left feeling as though I had read some kind of fairy tale as opposed to a book about real people.

Character Development: 3 Stars

June Bug was a pretty well developed character right up until the end of the book. In the end, she just took events way too ‘in stride’ for me to even imagine. Up to that point, she was immature and precocious in turns as you would expect from any child her age.

The father was far less developed and remained an enigma througout the novel.

The Sheriff was a well-rounded character that evoked plenty of empathy. However, again, his character fell flat in the end.

The grandmother was my favorite character. I cried for her at one point during a scene with her daughter. I wish there had been one more scene from her point of view in the end so I could have found out more about her feelings. I wondered if the author avoided that on purpose as I didn’t feel condoning the others’ actions would have fit into her personality.

Writing Style: 5 Stars

This was some of the best writing I have seen from a child’s viewpoint. Mr. Fabry had June Bug’s voice reaching out to the heart of the reader. Amazingly, he was able to switch to the adults’ voices easily without breaking the flow of the novel.

The dialogue was excellent. I especially enjoyed the wonderful metaphors contained within this story. Even June Bug’s metaphors fit her personality. This gave the descriptions a wonderful flavor.

Editing/Formatting: 5 Stars

Both were of professional quality.

Rating: PG for light Adult Situations.
————————————–

This book falls under the “Christian” or “Religious” Fiction genre. There is a bit of ‘preachiness’ in it here and there. This is just a warning for any of you who might care about that sort of thing. For the most part, the religious references did fit within the storyline.

Regardless of my low scoring of the Plot/Storyline, the writing style of Chris Fabry will have me coming back for more his novels. I do realize that the missing realism that bothered me will be exactly the sort of thing that will charm other readers.

——————————–

Here are some comments from the author, Chris Fabry:

How did you come up with the title?

I knew the title would be important, and I knew the little girl’s name would need to be catchy and memorable. I was at a writer’s conference in Colorado thinking about anything but the title and the name of the girl, when the speaker talked about the importance of place in the novel. I was doodling notes and wrote down “June Bug,” because that was part of what I remember growing up. We’d catch June Bugs, tie a string on them, and walk them around like pets. Suddenly I looked down and realized, “That’s her name.” Then I
knew it was also the title. It usually doesn’t happen as dramatically as
that for me, but it did this time.

How long have you been writing?

I’ve written since I was a child, but I had my first book published in 1995. Before that I did a local newspaper column and hosted radio shows, but not much in print.

What authors have inspired you?

My favorite book is To Kill A Mockingbird. I also love Pat Conroy’s writing and how you can smell the tides in South Carolina and taste the shrimp as you’re reading.

Where did you get the idea for the novel?

I was in the parking lot of a Walmart and saw an old RV parked there. I
wondered, “Who lives in these?” I see those RVs in parking lots across the country. I imagined someone coming in from the RV and walking into the store. A little girl. And her seeing her own face on the missing children list. Everything flowed from there.

Who is your favorite character?

June Bug just captivates me still. I think about her a lot, wonder how she’s doing, if she’s making friends, etc. But the Sheriff is on my mind, too. And Mae. Of course, John. There are just some really good characters here.

Biographical Information:

Chris Fabry is a writer and broadcaster who lives in Arizona. He is the
author of more than 65 books, including the New York Times bestseller, The Winners Manual, written with Coach Jim Tressel. He collaborated with Jerry B. Jenkins and Dr. Tim LaHaye on the children’s series Left Behind: The Kids. His first novel for adults, Dogwood, won a Christy Award in 2009. June Bug is his second novel for adults.

Chris is the host of Moody Radio’s Chris Fabry Live, heard on more than 200 outlets across the US. He is also the voice of the Love Worth Finding broadcast on radio and television. Chris and his wife, Andrea, are the parents of nine children.

June Bug, by Chris Fabry

UPDATE: This is not the first burial from violent death in Bradley Lockhart’s immediate family. Eleven years ago, his then-wife of seven years, Vickie Sue Lockhart, 28, was bound, gagged and shot, along with her sister and a friend in a home robbery homicide. The friend, 24-year-old David Lee Epps, had a brother, Joe Epps Staton, who had come into a $20,000 settlement a year ago, and the killers believed that Staton had the money stashed in the house. Staton was providentially absent from the house when the incident occurred; his mother Sheila believes that he had bragged about the money in public, but of course, it was in the bank, not in the house. The perps were sentenced to life in prison. Lockhart had three children with Vickie Sue, but they are being raised by their maternal grandparents.

Do you know what this means? Bradley Lockhart hasn’t had a real hand in raising his children since the death of his wife. Cheyenne Lockhart, 17, was raised by his black neighbors. Lockhart has been married at least twice.

Some guys indeed are just sperm donors.

Why does lightning have to strike twice?

—-

Well, looks as though I am going to have to take back my generous words about Bradley Lockhart. He may have loved his daughter, but it appears that he didn’t know how or wanted to raise her either. Check this new video and an article that’s come out from My NC, Wake County.

Several people who were close to 5-year-old Shaniya Davis and her father Brad Lockhart say they tried to intervene in the child’s life because they felt the little girl was at risk.

A close friend of Brad’s, and his ex-father-in-law both say they offered to take in Shaniya rather than let her live with her mother, because they say when the child was in the custody of her mother, bad things happened to her.

“My wife says she saw cigarette burns on Shaniya’s arms,” said Brad’s friend Tim Allen, who says he is very angry over what happened.

Byron Coleman, Brad’s ex-father-in-law, said Shaniya “had burns on her legs, arms and things” after visits with her mother.

“She had a cigarette burn on the corner of her eye, which she claimed her grandma did when she went over there,” added Shaniya’s half sister Cheyenne Lockhart.

The three all claimed that the 5-year-old suffered physical abuse while in the custody of her mother.

“When you wanted sex that’s where you went,” Coleman said. “You knew what the girl was doing. You knew what she associated with, so why place your daughter in that situation?”

Because of that, Coleman blames Lockhart for Shaniya’s death.

“To me Shaniya would be alive today if she wasn’t placed in that situation,” Coleman claims.

Coleman says he offered to give Shaniya a home, but says Brad declined his offer.

Allen tells a similar story.

“He had an alternative, I gave him a way out,” Allen explained; however Lockhart would not let Allen take care of Shaniya.

“I’m fighting mad. All this could have been avoided,” Allen said.

Why was Bradley Lockhart so insistent that Shaniya be returned to her mother’s home and raised by her when there was evidence that she was abusive and neglectful? Because it looks as though he was dumping Shaniya off no matter what the circumstances were at her mother’s.

Allen had already taken in Shaniya’s half sister Cheyenne, because she said her dad wouldn’t take care of her.

And Cheyenne says Brad did not provide for Shaniya.

“He didn’t take care of her, his girlfriends took care of her,” she said. “He loved her, but she was raised by other people. He hasn’t been in her life.”

Meanwhile, the Cumberland County Department of Social Services said it can not comment on what it was doing in regard to Shaniya because those comments might compromise the on-going criminal investigation.

All those histrionics after Shaniya was found…what an act if this is all true.

Shaniya was alone. All alone.

Her funeral is set for tomorrow at 3 p.m. at Manna Church, 5117 Cliffdale Road, Fayetteville.

I figured this was what Mario Andrette McNeill did with Shaniya Davis. He choked her to death and tried to hide the evidence of his crimes under bags of deer carcasses. No wonder he had that flicker of a smile on his face as he was being photographed and videoed. He was famous, even notorious now. No wonder he and her mother, Antoinette Davis, are separated from the jail population for their own protection. That there is honor even among thieves, so to speak, says a lot about how heinous a crime that has been committed.

I am going to say this: black people did not resist slavery in order to visit this kind of thing on our people. We saw so much and were probably reeling from so much even after slavery officially ended. And in some cases, it got worse for us. That’s exactly why our ancestors didn’t talk too much about their memories of slavery, of the days during and after Reconstruction, and of second-class wage slavery and American apartheid to their children and grandchildren; it was too painful on which to linger.

That even as a child of 10, 11 or 12, you could fall prey to a master, a master’s son or other relative, a white manager or worker. Or, to a master’s archaic ideas about multiplying his “herd” or “flock” by putting a ‘tween black girl with a fully-adult black male like horses or mules.

A girl’s feelings about who they are aren’t that well-developed, no matter how people may argue that the current culture has sexualized and desensitized children into thinking that they are mature. Now imagine a girl child of five being forcibly, wrenchingly introduced into that adult world of carnality. She’s not able to process mentally, much less physically, what in the world is happening to her. Shaniya could have sustained massive internal injuries during the rape. Had Shaniya had survived, she may not have been able to bear children. This isn’t anything new either. We have the testimonies of black women like Billie Holiday and Maya Angelou–Holiday and Angelou through autobiographies and memoirs–who were raped as baby girls. It’s just that simple–and horrifying to explain. Those stories were also meant as warnings, not just protest literature. It happened to us; it was not our fault.

Somehow, though, by not teaching and talking about this legacy–making it real beyond simply a school assignment–and by not repeating the poison of self-abnegation, we’ve got some generations who know no limits to dealing despair and cruelty to each other. So slavery too is back with a vengeance. Some 100,000 children of every color between 10-14 years old are sex slaves, some being pimped by their parents, the majority selling themselves on the street as runaways or being pimped by other adults. And there is indeed a market. We know there is, but it could be as distant from our minds like the modern slave trade in Africa. We need to agitate here so we can have some understanding of what is going on over there. A mother, who looks like a denizen from a bad dream, to sell her own daughter for some coke rocks? I thought that I had seen the last of this kind of thing in the Eighties and Nineties.

Even wearing McNeill and Davis wearing their hair in dreadlocks gives a bad name to the hair style. I don’t think Marley meant for his Rasta dreads to be imitative of dope fiends, but of released-from-mental-and-spiritual-bondage, proud-of-who-they are and lionized black people. But there they are on these two wastes of blood and semen. This too is how a legacy is obscured and misused. When I admired a brother’s dreads in New York at a subway station, he cautioned me about touching them because he considered them as nothing less than a sacrament. I had heard about people like this, but when confronted with it, I had to respect him. My curiosity could go no farther. I could not lay hands on him, or anything on his person, without his permission for whatever reason. There are limits about treating things and people that you don’t understand with disrespect, or robbing them of life.

But people like McNeill and Davis feel nothing. They look like they don’t give a flying you know what. All they feel is the rock talking through them. Antoinette in particular seems zombified. And so now, because of their own dreadful choices, they don’t even have their own lives any more because they have robbed this child of life. Did Antoinette feel nothing about the child while she was in her womb at all? What did she feel when she gave the girl to McNeill? Did she really think that she could have sanitized the girl’s absence with her father? All this because of Antoinette’s drug habit. Like I said, the bust in the summer could have been the reason why. Because the cops got his stash while McNeill was living with her sister, Antoinette must have owed him. Did he use a gun or just his physical strength against the mother in order to get “paid”?

Shaniya reminds me of my brother’s girls, my biracial nieces Tasha and her sister when they were little babies and toddlers. I can only look at their photographs as they were when they were five, and shake my head.

Teen charged with murder of Elizabeth Olten

By Jeff Haldiman and Bob Watson, News Tribune
with additional reporting by The AP
Published: Thursday, November 19, 2009 6:07 AM CST
“Our indictments are for adult-like crimes, and we will seek an adult-like punishment.” Those were the thoughts of Cole County Prosecutor Mark Richardson on Wednesday afternoon after the county’s grand jury found Alyssa Bustamante, 15, acted with cool reflection when she killed Elizabeth Olten, 9, on Oct. 21 near St. Martins.

Less than three hours after Bustamante was certified by Judge Jon Beetem to stand trial as an adult, the grand jury indicted her on charges of first-degree murder and armed criminal action.

Under the murder charge, Bustamante is alleged to have killed Olten by strangling her, cutting her throat and stabbing her.

Appearing before Cole County Presiding Judge Pat Joyce in a 1 p.m. hearing, Bustamante said she didn’t have money for a lawyer.

Joyce then read the charges, entered a plea of not guilty on the teen’s behalf and appointed the public defender’s office to represent her.

Bustamante, of St. Martins, is being held without bond in Morgan County for the Cole County Sheriff’s Department.

Richardson declined to tell reporters any of the specific details about the murder.

Because the case went through the grand jury, no probable cause statement was filed with the circuit clerk’s office as normally would occur with charges filed directly by the prosecutor.

Richardson said having the grand jury hear the case moved it forward faster.

Bustamante is the only person being charged in the murder, he said.

He noted that, under a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, the death penalty does not apply to those under the age of 18, so the maximum punishment in Bustamante’s case, if she is convicted, would be life in prison without parole.

Certified to stand trial as an adult

“She wanted to know what it felt like.” That was the reason given by the investigator who interviewed Alyssa Bustmante, 15, after last month’s death of Elizabeth Olten, 9.

In an adult certification hearing Wednesday morning, Cole County Judge Jon Beetem found the nature of the crime Bustamante committed was violent enough to warrant her being placed in adult custody.

Upon the judge’s ruling, Cole County Sheriff Greg White arrested Bustamante on the charge of first-degree murder, placed her in custody and led her out of the courtroom.

Bustamante, wearing an orange jail jumpsuit, showed little emotion during the hearing and did not speak.

Samantha Green, attorney for the Cole County Juvenile Authority, called several witnesses. Among them was Jefferson City High School Principal Jeff Dodson, who told the court Alyssa’s grades were As and Bs prior to this incident. He said she attended school on a regular basis and was in school each day before Elizabeth’s death.

Dodson said Alyssa had no behavioral problems, according to their records. He also said he had just casual contact with the girl, and considered her to be an average 15-year-old.

Also called to testify was Bill Heberle with the Missouri Division of Youth Services, who talked about what services the state might have available to treat Alyssa.

Attorney Kurt Valentine, who was appointed by the court to represent Alyssa during the juvenile process, had Heberle talk about how they would work to try and find a care program to fit what Alyssa would need, if she were kept as a juvenile offender.

Green also called David Cook to the stand. He is the chief juvenile officer for the Cole County’s 19th Circuit Court.

Cook said his office had been able to determine Bustamante had been in Cole County for six years, living with her grandmother who had been her guardian since 2001.

He said that, until this incident, there had been no referrals on Alyssa and his office had no contact with her.

In September 2007, Cook said they found that Alyssa had spent 10 days in Mid-MO Mental Health Center after a suicide attempt, and then was treated through Pathways Community Behavioral Healthcare, dealing with depression.

He said Alyssa and her family were very involved and had attended treatment regularly. She had been prescribed Prozac for her depression.

Cook said there was an episode last year, while she attended the Simonsen 9th Grade Center where she delved into the Goth culture, which is typically associated with dark clothing and makeup as well as a fascination with vampires. He said the family had expressed concerns about Alyssa getting on the Internet and finding information about Goth activity, but that eventually stopped.

Cook also said Alyssa spent time in the woods without permission.

Based on all this information, Cook said, it would be his recommendation that Alyssa be certified to stand trial as an adult.

The last witness Green called was Sgt. David Rice, an investigator with the Missouri Highway Patrol, who interviewed Alyssa after she was taken into custody.

Valentine argued that Rice’s testimony would be more relevant to the process of finding innocence or guilt in this case and that was not what the certification hearing was about.

But Green argued that Rice’s testimony provided information to help the court make its decision, saying it showed the violence of this crime.

Rice testified Alyssa told him she had dug two holes the Friday prior to the killing, and did lead authorities to Elizabeth’s body.

In closing arguments, an emotional Green told Judge Beetem that Alyssa, regardless of her need for rehabilitation, had committed a serious crime and that if left in the juvenile system would be allowed to walk out at the age of 21.

“I don’t know what type of rehabilitation we can offer,” Green said.

Valentine argued this case puts us in uncharted waters.

“None of us want to be here,” he said. “The most telling thing we’ve found is we don’t know what to do.”

Further Background: Officials were called about 7 p.m. on Oct. 21, after Elizabeth Olten didn’t make it to her home in the 200 block of LoMo Drive (Route D) near St. Martins after leaving a friend’s home in the 600 block about 6:15 p.m.

Sheriff’s deputies, firefighters and volunteers began searching for the girl quickly, and continued that search Oct. 22 and 23, until Elizabeth’s body was found about 2:40 p.m. Oct. 23.

“It was in the woods, several hundred yards away from the houses,” Sheriff Greg White told reporters after the discovery. “We had been (searching) through that area more than once.

“The body was very well concealed.”

White told reporters that Elizabeth knew the suspect, who is not related. White said that physical and written evidence led investigators to question the suspect, who then led them to the location where the body was found.

A missing 5-year-old whose mother was accused of offering her for sex was found dead off a heavily wooded road in a rural area Monday, ending a weeklong search, police said.

Searchers found Shaniya Davis’ body southeast of Sanford, in central North Carolina, Fayetteville Police spokeswoman Theresa Chance told The Associated Press. Police did not say how she died.

Read more here:
http://www.letstalkhonestly.com/blacknewsblackviews.html

Scores of volunteers are combing the area with police. Poor baby:

The Endangered/Missing poster for Shaniya Davis, put out by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (Courtesy: Examiner.com)

Police searching for 5-year-old Shaniya Davis in a wooded area off N.C. 87 near Sanford say they are looking for a body.

Based on “reliable information,” they believe her body may have been dumped off Walker Road near its intersection with the highway, said police spokeswoman Theresa Chance.

About 250 people and two helicopters are searching both sides of Walker Road near where it intersects with N.C. 87. They include police and sheriff’s deputies from Fayetteville, Sanford and Lee County, fire department personnel and civilians who live in the area and who know the woods.

At a press briefing at 10:30 a.m., Chance said people have been turning out in droves to offer help but no more volunteer searchers are currently needed. She said civilians who want to help can call the police at 433-1820 to volunteer.

Meantime, the State Highway Patrol issued a ‘be on the lookout for’ advisory this morning, saying that they’re looking for a man who had been spotted with Davis. The man is believed to be about 60 years old and driving a blue Toyota, according to an official with the Highway Patrol. He may be in the vicinity of Raeford Road or Cliffdale Road.

Chance said police are following up any and all tips but are still concentrating their search for Shaniya on Walker Road.

At a press conference at the search site at 9 a.m. today, Chance said police had received some tips.

She said Mario Andrette McNeill, who has admitted to kidnapping Shaniya and is in custody, has been “extremely uncooperative” but has given some information to police.

Chance said McNeill is known to frequent Sanford. He was arrested Thursday after being identified as being with Shaniya Tuesday morning at the Comfort Suites hotel in Sanford. The two were seen on a surveillance tape at 6:11 a.m. Chance said police know McNeill left the motel with Shaniya at about 7:30 a.m. but they don’t know what condition Shaniya was in at that point.

Events like this makes one want lose all hope in people.

This is weird upon weird. There’s a nasty missing piece here that I don’t like to dwell on.

He knows something we don't, and he loves it. Mario Andrette McNeill, 29, won't say where Shaniya Davis is (Courtesy: Fayettville, NC Police Dept)

On November 11, a family who has had several run-ins with the social services department as well as with the police in Fayetteville, North Carolina called in to the cops to say that their little daughter had disappeared. The child, Shaniya Nicole Davis, 5, was last seen by her mother, Antoinette Davis, around 5:30 a.m., when she allegedly placed the little girl back to sleep on a couch in the living room. Davis, her boyfriend, her sister, along with another infant and Shaniya’s 7-year-old brother were present when the girl disappeared from her home at the Sleepy Hollow Mobile Home Park.

Shaniya Nicole Davis in a recent photograph (Courtesy: CBS News)

Naturally, foul play was immediately suspected, and an Amber Alert was raised. Not only that, Nancy Grace picked it up and gave the case national attention on her evening show on HLN. Grace gets too shrill for my taste, but she does some things right: namely playing up to the hilt the stories of missing or murdered women and children.

A couple of days as well as two suspects later, and police think that they have the perpetrator. Problem is, he isn’t saying anything about what he did with Shaniya. He’s just admitting that he did kidnap her. From the Fayetteville Observer:

Mario Andrette McNeil, 29, turned himself in early Friday after police released surveillance video showing him and Shaniya at a Sanford hotel. A kidnapping charge was then dropped against another man, Clarence D. Coe, who had been arrested Wednesday night.

The case has turned into a nationwide search for Shaniya, involving the FBI and the U.S. Marshals Service. Fayetteville police say they’ve received hundreds of tips, and Shaniya’s pictures have aired on national television shows.

But no one has seen the girl since Tuesday morning, when she disappeared from the Sleepy Hollow Mobile Home Park off Murchison Road.

Her father, Bradley Lockhart, was anxious Friday night to hear any news about his missing daughter as he waited in his Fayetteville home with friends and family members. He said his daughter had lived with him for the past three or four years. He let her live with her mother, Antoinette Davis, about three weeks ago because she had found a place to live and had held a job for six months, he said.

“I just wanted her to be a mother,” he said. “She was never part of her life.”

The girl’s parents had never married.

Theresa Chance, a Fayetteville police spokeswoman, said Lockhart has been questioned and ruled out as a suspect.

Surveillance video at an undisclosed nearby hotel showed McNeil carrying Shaniya to a room around 6:11 a.m. Shaniya and the man were at the hotel for about an hour, police determined, after a hotel worker recognized the child on the video from news reports, and called the cops. But the hotel is described as being 40 miles away from Shaniya’s home. If McNeil grabbed the girl, he must have floored it at 80-90 miles per hour to get there.

From the video, the girl looked comfortable in the arms of her possible assailant. She did not struggle or make noise. Which means that she knew him already.

Reading Grace’s blog on the case, I’ve found out that Shaniya’s maternal aunt may have been Mario McNeill’s former girlfriend.

Shaniya Davis, of course, is biracial. The mother, Antoinette Davis, who has cooperated with authorities, has yet to make a public statement about her daughter. Is she overcome, distraught at the disappearance and possible death of her child? Her feelings are unknown at present. Lockhart doesn’t even know how to reach Davis, and at this point, doesn’t care about her or about the men in her life. I can’t say that I blame him.

But I cannot get out of my mind that there is something wrong here. And it may have something to do with the fact that drugs were previously found the girl’s home which may have led to social services to take Shaniya away and placing her once more with her father.

[Fayetteville police spokeswoman Theresa] Chance said police have been called to the home before. This summer, officers served a search warrant at the home and found a variety of drugs inside.

The family was not allowed inside the home Tuesday evening after it was deemed a health hazard due to extensive sewage leaks, authorities said.

Police K-9s, firefighters and sheriff’s deputies searched the area throughout the day Tuesday.

“We are searching for her and hoping to find her alive, but we just don’t know at this point,” Chance said.

McNeill is pleading not guilty. He’s got a criminal record, but it’s nothing to do with child molestation. (Two or three of them do live within proximity of Shaniya’s home.) McNeill was imprisoned for aggravated assault and drug possession. Lately, he’s been picked up for traffic violations. I’m just wondering whether Shaniya’s abduction has anything to do with the drugs that were found in the little girl’s home.

Clarence Darriel Coe, who was first suspected of making off with Shaniya, has been released. Coe, 30, is the boyfriend of Antoinette Davis.

While he never lived at the home, Coe said he is the boyfriend of Shaniya’s mother. He said he doesn’t know McNeill. Coe, unfortunately, was no saint. He too, like McNeill, had a criminal record.

Neighbors Travis Smith and George King said they often saw Shaniya playing and frequently saw her mother with Coe.

“He seemed more upset about the girl being missing than the mother did, because he kept pacing up and down the hill, looking like he was mad or whatever that the girl was gone,” said Smith, who lives two doors down from the Davis family. “To find out he got arrested, it kind of threw me off the track a little bit.”

[...]

Coe appealed for the return of the girl, who he said calls him daddy.

“Whoever knows where Shaniya is, just do the right thing,” he said.

But Antoinette Davis or her sister may know who Mario Andrette McNeill is. And Coe’s getting upset might have something to do with knowing that he would be interrogated by the cops once again.

So we have two men, one white, and one black. One is her natural father, the other seems to have been perfectly happy to play stepfather to the child of his girlfriend. They don’t know each other, but each appeared to give a damn for little Shaniya.

Where is Antoinette Davis in all this?

I’m sorry, but I’m really suspicious.

Could it be that Antoinette Davis gave the child to McNeill to hide from the father? Or that McNeill stole Shaniya because he saw an opportunity? And for what purpose?

Or that in revenge for allowing all or part of his stash to be taken by the cops, McNeill took Shaniya and did away with her?

They’ve got to find that baby.

People Magazine’s newest cover  features 6 missing children that have disappeared this year. One of them is Florida boy,  Adji Desir.

Adji Desir

Remember Adji,  the little boy who has been missing since January 10, 2009?  There has been virtually no media coverage on his case for months.   “Ji Ji” was visiting his grandmother in Imokalee, Florida while his mother was at work when he simply disappeared without a trace. He was last seen at around 5:15 PM playing with other children in front of his grandmother’s house.

There have been no witnesses come forward, and no clues as to what could have happened to him have been found. It’s like he just ceased to exist.

Adji’s turned 7 in October. He is developmentally disabled and functions on the level of a 2 year old.  He recognizes about 5 English words, including his name. His family needs to know what happened to their “Ji Ji”.

If you have information or think you  may have seen this little boy, please contact  the Collier County Sheriff’s Office: 1-239- 793-9300  You can also  call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-780-TIPS (8477) and annonymously report information about Adji Desir, the other children featured in this week’s People, or another missing child you might have knowledge of.

It’s heartbreaking to know there are so many missing children out there who have not received the national coverage that could help bring them home. These kids’ stories are every bit as important as the high-profile cases of Caylee Anthony, Haleigh Cummings, and Trenton Duckett.   They deserve to be found, and their families deserve to have closure.  KUDOS to People Magazine for their part in helping these children receive national attention!

I picked up this book after the author visited the high school I work at to talk about her books and about being a writer; it wasn’t something I would normally try.  Sam is the daughter and only child of the pastor of a small town church with a lot of responsibilities and little pay.  Her life has been spiraling down for years as she struggled to hide her mother’s alcoholism and deal with her father’s emotional distance, but at the beginning of the book things have fallen apart.  Her mother is in rehab and Sam gradually discovers that the town already knows what she’s been very intent on hiding.  Then, a member of the youth group goes missing, right off the street of the small town.  It seems like there is no one to trust; Sam suspects the owner of the hardware store she’s been visiting, she becomes friends with the victim’s older brother who is also a suspect, her father at one point is a suspect, her mother won’t return calls from the rehab facility, her best friend isn’t real around her because Sam is the pastor’s daughter, Sam may have to go to the public school and make new friends anyway because no one has donated money to pay next year’s tuition, and finally, Sam strongly suspects that the young female youth minister is making the moves on her father. 

I started reading this book slowly, trying to get into all of the plot twists in Sam’s life.  As the story progressed I read faster, wanting to know what happened to the missing girl and hoping for just one positive thing to happen for Sam…

Three doctors, a nurse and a receptionist have all been arrested for swiping babies in Mexico. Is this really necessary? I mean, there’s got to be enough to go around. That’s like stealing out of the “Give a Penny, Take a Penny” cup at the gas station.

And a receptionist? What kind of role were they playing in this whole deal? Did they have to stand in front of the nurse while she walked out with a baby under her shirt? A married couple and a woman who bought a couple of babies were also arrested – I guess for buying babies?

The doctors were telling the parents of the newborns that their babies had died while the nurses snuck behind them with the babies up their shirts – pulling the old, Hidden Ball Trick #67. When the parents asked, “Can we see our dead baby?” the doctors would simply reply, “No, you can’t. The baby has already evaporated into thin air which is what Mexican babies do when they die, leaving behind a small pile of good-smelling dust which I’ve put into this baggy.”

In all honesty, these doctors were actually telling the parents that their babies were cremated. So, my little bit about the dust really isn’t too far off.

A mother asked the doctor for the baby’s ashes or at least a death certificate October 27, and the doctor replied: “I already told you. She died. I took her to be incinerated. There’s nothing more to talk about or do. The documents are on the way.”

What do you think the price is for a Mexican baby? (Answer below)

Mexican babies were going for $1,100.