FORT WAYNE, Ind. (AP) — A babysitter and trusted neighbor has confessed that he bludgeoned a 9-year-old Indiana girl to death with a brick then dismembered her, hiding her head, hands and feet at his home and dumping the rest of her remains nearby, police said Tuesday.
Allen County sheriff's investigators said in an affidavit that 39-year-old Michael Plumadore admits he killed Aliahna Lemmon on Dec. 22.
According to the affidavit, Plumadore told police that after beating Aliahna to death, he stuffed her body into trash bags and hid her in the freezer at his trailer. He said he later chopped up her body and stuffed her remains into freezer bags.
Police said Plumadore told them he had hidden Aliahna's head, feet and hands at his trailer and that he had discarded her other remains at a nearby business. Police obtained a warrant to search his trailer on Monday and found the body parts.
A judge ordered Plumadore held without bail or bond at an initial hearing Tuesday, sheriff's department spokesman Cpl. Jeremy Tinkel said. He has yet to be formally charged in Aliahna's death.
Aliahna and her two younger sisters were staying with Plumadore because their mother had been sick with the flu.
Plumadore told The Journal Gazette on Sunday that Aliahna disappeared from his home Friday morning while he was sleeping after having gone 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.
More than 100 emergency workers searched for her Saturday around the rundown mobile home park where Aliahna and Plumadore lived and FBI agents were there Monday.
A state website shows that 15 registered sex offenders live in the park that numbers about two dozen homes. Plumadore is not on Indiana's registered sex offenders list. He has a criminal record in Florida and North Carolina that includes convictions for trespassing and assault.
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