A 10-year-old girl who was missing from Philadelphia for 10 days was found dead in a car in Lindenwold, New Jersey.
Jalayshia Alford was last seen alive in Philadelphia on the morning of Oct. 26, according to the missing person’s notice put out by the Philadelphia Police Department.
Law enforcement sources told Philadelphia’s WTXF-TV that she was found dead in a car trunk parked at a Lindenwold apartment complex on Wednesday night.
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The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office did not specify Jalayshia’s cause of death but classified it as a “brutal murder,” according to WPVI-TV.
There are conflicting reports about the circumstances of Jalayshia’s disappearance from the adults in her life.
While her foster mother said the girl never returned home from school on Oct. 26, Jalayshia’s aunt Yolanda Brown told the Philadelphia Inquirer that she was told that the 10-year-old missed school on Oct. 23 and 26.
Philadelphia Police Deputy Police Commissioner Frank Vanore said Jalayshia was last seen in footage taken on her block returning from school on Oct. 22, according to the Inquirer.
Family members of Jalayshia told KYW-TV that the girl’s foster mother, whom they did not name, told them that the 10-year-old had gone to visit her biological mother. The family members said Jalayshia was not found at her biological mother’s residence and that in fact her biological mother did not have visitation rights with Jalayshia.
A law enforcement source told the Inquirer that the car that Jalayshia was found in belongs to a relative of her foster mother. Law enforcement has not identified any suspects publicly, though murder charges in the case were expected to be announced Thursday evening.
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