GUILTY AR - Patricia Miles, 7, Gilmore, 15 Aug 2004

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Sorry, I am new and have not learned to post links.

This is a rather bizarre case of a missing 7 year old. I saw the Amber Alert and did a Google search on her name, clicked news, sort by date. Sounds like a babysitter did something with her, she went missing Sunday morning and her shoes and bike were found later that night. The babysitter has been taken into custody but is not cooperating. Very strange.
 
Hello Mom who Cares,

Here is what I have so far on Patricia. http://wreg.com/Global/story.asp?S=2176930


Gilmore, AR - Authorities in Eastern Arkansas are on day 4 of their search for a missing 6-year-old girl. Patricia Ann Miles was last seen at a Gilmore Grocery Store on Sunday. Since then, authorities have arrested the child's babysitter.

August 17, 2004

GILMORE, Ark. (AP) - A judge set a one (m) million-dollar bond today for a woman charged with kidnapping in the disappearance of a 6-year-old girl in Crittenden County. But searchers still had not located the child who vanished Sunday.

Family friend Jo Ann Buchanan was arrested Monday on the kidnapping charge, and investigators said today that the woman would not speak about what may have become of Patricia Ann Miles. The girl was last seen riding her pink bicycle to the Bufford Grocery in Gilmore about 8:15 a.m. Sunday.

At the bond hearing, prosecutors said a witness saw Buchanan put the girl and her bicycle into her van on Sunday morning. About 45 minutes later, another witness saw the van stopped on Arkansas 77. It was near that spot that searchers found the bicycle and Patricia's shoes. Those items were found about 1 a.m. Monday. An arraignment is set for Wednesday on the kidnapping charge.

Police say the search for the girl is continuing today in Mississippi County. Anyone who has seen Patricia Ann Miles, or has any information on her whereabouts should call the sheriff's department at 870-702-2000 or Crittenden County Crimestoppers at 870-732-4444.
 
Sheilaursarteam: Thanks for posting that info! I wonder what the big development LE has to announce today is?
 
For Patricia, Hope you are soon home and safe!
 
Patricia's body was found:

Thursday, August 19, 2004 · Last updated 9:34 p.m. PT

Body of missing Arkansas girl found

By MELISSA NELSON
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

GILMORE, Ark. -- The body of a 7-year-old girl missing since Sunday was found Thursday night in a northeastern Arkansas field not far from where her shoes and pink bicycle had been recovered days earlier.

The family's pastor, the Rev. Stephen Chitman, said police searching among corn and soybean fields found the body of Patricia Ann Miles, who disappeared Sunday morning after riding her bike to a grocery store. Television footage showed family members wailing after officers told them about her death.

Neither the state police nor the Crittenden County Sheriff's Office would provide further details Thursday night.

Patricia's pink bicycle was found early Monday in a cornfield, about 100 yards from her shoes.

A family friend was arrested on a kidnapping charge and was being held on $1 million bond. Jo Ann Buchanan, who occasionally baby-sat the girl, has refused to cooperate with authorities.


Investigators have not offered a motive for the kidnapping and Buchanan's relatives have insisted she is innocent.

Witnesses have said they saw the girl get into a van with Buchanan Sunday morning and later saw Buchanan take the girl's bicycle from the van in a rural area north of Gilmore, in northeastern Arkansas.

More than 100 police officers and volunteers combed farmland, fields and ditches in the search for Patricia.


http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Missing Girl Arkansas

God rest her beautiful little soul.
 
This is so sad. What a beautiful little girl.

Rest in peace, precious Patricia.
You will not be forgotten.

With prayers for the family, and for justice.
With love and HOPE, Lanie
 
Man this is sure sad. This happened about 100 miles northeast from my home, and the little girls is the same age as my little girl.


Saw it on the local news last night. Just breaks my heart and really hits close to home. We were all hoping and praying for the best, but sounded pretty bad from the get-go.
 
Also, the word we got was that the woman charged may have had some kind of grudge against the family.
 
I'd like someone to tell me what a 7 year old was doing riding her bike ALONE to a grocery store in the first place. I know that her family didn't want this to happen, but I'm getting real sick and tired of hearing about these little children being left alone all the time. I don't know what her parents were doing while she was riding her bike outside all alone, but I'm quite sure now that whatever it was, does't seem so important to them now. Will parents ever learn??? :furious: :furious:
 
Jeana (DP) said:
I'd like someone to tell me what a 7 year old was doing riding her bike ALONE to a grocery store in the first place. I know that her family didn't want this to happen, but I'm getting real sick and tired of hearing about these little children being left alone all the time. I don't know what her parents were doing while she was riding her bike outside all alone, but I'm quite sure now that whatever it was, does't seem so important to them now. Will parents ever learn??? :furious: :furious:

I whole-heartedly agree Jeana. I have a hard time letting my kids play in the front yard alone, and don't unless I can see them out the window.

This city that Patricia lived in is a poor, rural community. I think this grocery store was close to her home and her parents had let her go there by herself before, as well as other places in and around town. Probably didn't think ANYTHING like this could happen.

A very sad tragedy for them, and a somber lesson for the rest of us parents.
 
From 2005:

http://www.theeveningtimes.com/articles/2005/02/22/news/news2.txt

The case that shocked and intrigued all of Crittenden County ended in a plea of guilty and a sentence of life in prison on Friday, and left several unanswered questions...

Investigators said that Buchanan told them that she would plead guilty before her trial on one condition — that she didn't have to wear an orange jumpsuit when she did it... Deputies and prosecutors all walked on eggshells as they waited what they have waited from day one to hear, for Jo Ann to give some indication of why she did it. She did not...

"She will not ever see a parole board," said Martin. "She will not be eligible for parole unless the governor commutes her sentence to a term of a number of years."
 
I found out about this case from this video:

[video=youtube;JhDZu5E0iMk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhDZu5E0iMk[/video]

it's very sad and very eerie how someone a young girl knew for so long can just kill her for no reason :(
 

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