Bush Making Big Return To White House
Annette Insdorf: The Central Park Five Premieres in Cannes
Updated Nov. 20: Mario Andrette McNeill is being charged with first-degree murder and first-degree rape of a child in the death of 5-year-old Shaniya Davis, Fayetteville Police Chief Tom Bergamine told reporters at a news conference Thursday, Nov. 19. Preliminary test results point to asphyxiation as the cause of death, said Bergamine, adding that testing has not yet been completed. According to WRAL-TV, investigators have not yet figured out where Shaniya was killed, but Bergamine said he did not believe it was at the hotel.
As previously reported, McNeill was allegedly seen in surveillance video footage carrying Shaniya into a hotel in Sanford, NC on Nov. 10. He was jailed on kidnapping charges in the case after turning himself in on Nov. 12.
Updated Nov. 17: The father of 5-year-old Shaniya Davis shared his grief with around 500 people Monday evening during a prayer vigil in a store parking lot about 40 miles from where the girl's body was found. "Lord, I come to you with open arms and it is hard. It is hard," Bradley Lockhart cried out in prayer. "Don't give up on me and don't give up on Shaniya. She's right there with you." (To see AP video of the prayer vigil, go here)
Meanwhile, the mother who is accused of selling Shaniya for sex, Antoinette Davis, entered no plea during a brief court appearance Monday. She is being held on $51,000 bail. According to the Fayetteville Observer, a boyfriend who was a previous suspect said that Davis is pregnant with his child. That boyfriend, Clarence Coe, has since been cleared of all suspicion in the case. Davis has at least one other child, a seven-year-old.
When I heard Sunday night that police were calling off the search for 5-year-old Shaniya Davis for the evening, I was baffled and angry. How could they stop looking for this little North Carolina girl, who was reportedly sold into prostitution by her own mother, even for a second? I didn't want to entertain the obvious: that they knew she was probably dead.
Now the horrible truth is official. Searchers found Shaniya's body Monday along a local highway, say police. A couple hundred volunteers had scoured miles of landscape, roads, ravines and fields on four-wheelers and with helicopters to find her.
As previously posted by Dr. Boyce Watkins, the youngster's mother, 25-year-old Antoinette Davis has been charged with human trafficking and felony child abuse and is accused of offering Shaniya for prostitution. Police have also charged 29-year-old Mario Andrette McNeill, who was allegedly seen in surveillance video footage, carrying Shaniya into a hotel. Police say McNeill admitted to kidnapping the girl, although he is expected to plead not guilty to the charge.
Shaniya had only been living with her mother for several weeks. She had been raised by her father, Bradley Lockhart, who allowed her to live with her mom after Davis said she had gotten a new job and a new home. Shaniya had been the result of a "one-night stand," claimed Lockhart, although he said they never had issues about raising Shaniya. Understandably, he now says he regrets the decision to send Shaniya to live with her mother.
Much has been made of the interracial aspect of this case on the Black Voices message boards. Davis is black and Lockhart is white. That has led to all kinds of unfounded speculation that Lockhart was a john and Davis a prostitute, blah, blah, blah. I can't for the life of me understand why people get caught up in such details, when what really matters is that this child was truly loved by her father and truly betrayed by her mother (if what she's charged with turns out to be true).
Lest we forget how much Shaniya was loved, take a look at the video below. This morning, Lockhart and his sister pleaded for Shaniya's safe return on CBS News' 'The Early Show.'
Now she's safe in the arms of the angels.
Watch CBS News Videos Online
______________
Sheryl Huggins Salomon is contributing editor of Black Voices, where she writes about politics and society. She is co-editor of the 'Nia Guide for Black Women' series of self-improvement books and the former publisher of Shade magazine. Follow her on Twitter or contact her at BVCEditor@aol.com.
Comments: (43)
Add a comment
By: kat on 11/20/2009 3:16PM
anything they get from the justice system is too good. what needs to happen is handcuff both to a chair take a stick of dynmate cut the fuse real short and light it don't use any vasline and watch them from outside the room. how and why would a female am not going to call her a mother because she does not earn that word female allow that to happen to her child when their are females like myself who will never know the feeling of having a child do that she is a cold hearted b**** and for him i have worked in the prison system and believe me they will make him sorry for what he did to that beautiful child. prison has their own justice system of handling people like him he is a worthless piece of s***.
Reply to this Comment | Report This
By: LadyJNewYork on 11/23/2009 2:11PM
My, my evil in its purest form. What a "demonic, evil" being. May this child soul rest in peace. Oh bless the Lord.
Reply to this Comment | Report This
By: J.Hill on 11/27/2009 10:58PM
Exactly!!!! Did you see the father's home? It's beautiful. However, that trailer park is run down, and the mother's trailer was even smaller and more run down than the others and had a raw sewage leak. Even the manager of that mobile home park said that the trailer was not fit for human habitation. Now tell me how it is that this GREAT father could leave his beautiful little 5 yr. old girl in that environment without a backwards glance. And I say that because he never called her to check up on her after dumping her in that filthy place. A real concerned father, who loves his child as much as he claimed to have, would have automatically done this. Surely he would want to know how she's doing or if she needed anything. After all he had her all her life. All parents ask their school-age children about school, right? Not this concerned father. She was out of school for several weeks prior to her demise. Surely that would have been a red flag. If the father truly cared so much, why did he not call her or stop by to check on her? Come on , that trailer park scares me, and I'm 43 yrs. old. Surely, it scared Shaniya too, especially after living so nicely with her father. Also, his neighbors, who were already allowing his teenage daughter to live with them because he kicked her out of the house, offered to take Shaniya too. His former father-in-law offered the same since they had already raised his other children. He initially told the couple yes, but abruptly changed his mind. He refused the other request as well. So while Shaniya's mother is being investigated, look at the father too.
Reply to this Comment | Report This