A 13-year-old Florida girl was said to be missing by her caretakers, but authorities discovered that she had been murdered two months later by one of them.
The girl was reported missing in May. Her body was found last month in a field off an interstate, PEOPLE reported.
Her stepmother and aunt have both been charged with murder in connection to Delia Young’s death.
Valerie Young, 52, and Marian Williams, 57, were indicted by an Alachua County grand jury.
Williams has been identified as the stepmother and guardian of the teen. Marian and Valerie Young—Williams’ sister and the girl’s aunt—are now facing first-degree murder, two counts of neglect of a child with great bodily harm, tampering with physical evidence, resisting arrest without violence, and making false reports to law enforcement authorities regarding a capital felony.
The stepmother reported the 13-year-old missing on May 16, claiming she had disappeared the night before and said she often ran away from home.
Apparently, Williams eventually told police that she had witnessed Young beating on Delia the same day she was reported missing. She asked the girl did she want to go to the hospital, but Williams claimed the girl said no.
It was the following day Williams found her dead in her bedroom, the arrest report reads.
The day after that, the woman took Delia’s body in a bag and drove to a house in Lacrosse, where they left the bag. But when they returned to the house days later, they found the bag outside, but the girl’s body was missing.
Authorities did not recover Delia’s body until June 2.
An Alachua County School District employee told WCBJ that at least eight allegations of abuse regarding Delia had been reported over a four-year time span to the Florida Department of Children and Family Services. The employee admits that the “system failed” the child.
“There are many times where she would be limping and complaining of pains in her hip,” the employee told WCBJ. “There was a time that her hand was extremely swollen, and she couldn’t use it to write, possibly broken. There were times when her whole back was bruised and scratched up.”
