A BABYSITTER has been charged with murdering a nine-year-old girl after he told police that he had bludgeoned and dismembered her three days before Christmas, authorities said.
Aliahna Maroney-Lemmon was reported missing from Fort Wayne, Indiana on December 23rd. More than 100 emergency workers searched the trailer park where she lived before Michael Plumadore, 39, was arrested on St Stephen’s Day.
Plumadore was charged with murder, abuse of a corpse and removing a dead body from the scene in the killing of Maroney-Lemmon.
Authorities say Plumadore told police he killed Aliahna in the early hours of December 22. He had been looking after the girl and her two younger sisters because their mother was sick. He had looked after Aliahna’s dying grandfather and her family had considered him a trusted friend and neighbour.
According to court documents, Plumadore told police he hit the girl repeatedly in the head with a brick. He then put the girl’s body into rubbish bags and stuffed it inside a freezer in the trailer where he had lived with her grandfather.
Plumadore told authorities that he later used a hack saw to dismember her body.
Danielle Edenfield, the Allen County prosecutor’s office chief investigator, said Friday the charges would be read to him in jail. An initial court hearing on the formal charges is scheduled for Wednesday.
Allen County Chief Deputy Prosecutor Mike McAlexander told The News-Sentinel today that his office “has not precluded” the possibility of seeking the death penalty against Plumadore.
Police said Plumadore told them he had hidden Aliahna’s head, feet and hands at the trailer and discarded her other remains at a nearby business. Police obtained a warrant to search the trailer on Monday and found the body parts.
Plumadore has a criminal record in Florida and North Carolina that includes convictions for trespassing and assault, and an Indiana conviction for forgery.
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