Detroit Police Makes Arrest in 5-year-old Mariha Smith's Murder
Detroit police made an arrest in the murder of 5-year-old Mariha Smith, MyFoxDetroit.com reported. Darnell Cheatham, the aunt's boyfriend, has been named a person of interest in the little girl's death and was taken into custody Friday. The little girl was staying with her aunt in Burlingame when she was kidnapped.
Mariha was then suffocated and set on fire.
"It's good, but it doesn't bring her back. It's a sad day because it shouldn't have happened," family friend Gennett Cooper told MyFoxDetroit.com
Cheatham was suspected when investigators released a video of a man buying gasoline a couple of blocks from where the little girl's body was found.
24-year-old Konesha Smith, Mariha's mother, admitted that she was passed out and drunk during the kidnapping.
Many family members of the missing girl hoped that she was alive and continued to post fliers with her picture around the neighborhood after the kidnapping.
Family friends said that the aunt was to blame for the murder.
Mariha was laid to rest Friday, the same day that Cheatham was arrested.
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