Alabama child murder case: father held after five bodies found

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/10/alabama-child-case-father-held-after-five-bodies-found

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A man is suspected of killing his five children in South Carolina and then driving for hours before dumping their bodies in bags on a dirt road in rural Alabama, authorities have said.

Timothy Ray Jones Jr, 32, led investigators to the site where the bodies of the children were found off a two-lane highway near Camden, Alabama, said Sergeant Steve Jarrett.

Jones was charged with child neglect and police expected to lodge additional charges against him in connection with the children’s deaths, authorities in South Carolina and Mississippi said.

The children ranged from one to eight years old and had been reported missing by their mother on 3 September, authorities said.

Michael Jackson, district attorney in Wilcox county, Alabama, said Jones was suspected of killing the children in South Carolina before bringing their bodies to Alabama.

Police did not release details on how the children died. The Lexington county coroner, Earl Wells, was arranging for the children’s bodies to be taken back to South Carolina for autopsies and identification on Tuesday night, sheriff’s officials said.

At the scene where authorities said the bodies were found, investigators could be seen late on Tuesday working in a clearing at the top of a hill lit by floodlights.

Jones was being held in Smith county, Mississippi, awaiting extradition to South Carolina, the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation said.

He had been detained in Smith county on Saturday after being stopped at a road checkpoint near Raleigh, Mississippi, and charged with drunken driving, Smith county Sheriff Charlie Crumpton said.

Crumpton said Jones became agitated when a deputy questioned him about a smell of chemicals coming from the Cadillac Escalade he was driving. The deputy found what were believed to be chemicals used to manufacture methamphetamine and a substance believed to be the street drug Spice, a form of synthetic marijuana, Crumpton said. A sheriff’s office investigator was called and found what appeared to be bleach, muriatic acid, blood and possible body fluids, he said.

During a background check police discovered that Jones was wanted in South Carolina “regarding a welfare concern of his children” who were on a national missing persons list, the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation said.

Investigators from several departments and the FBI started looking for the missing children on Monday, Crumpton said. He said the children’s decomposed bodies were found in individual plastic garbage bags.

Jarrett told a news conference that authorities were not sure why Jones drove through Alabama.

Jones had joint custody of the children and was divorced from their mother, police said. They said he had told neighbours in South Carolina that he and the children were moving to another state.