JOSHUA SUMMERIES - 5 months - / Charged: Mother's boyfriend, Demetries Thorpe - Zion, IL

August 27, 2013 11:32 AM



Joshua Summeries Update: Demetries Thorpe, Ill. man, charged with murder in case of missing infant



Joshua Summeries

/ Zion Police via CBS Chicago

(CBS) ZION, Ill. - Police in the northern Illinois suburb of Zion say they've ended their search of a landfill without finding the remains of a missing 5-month-old boy. However, they have charged 26-year-old Demetries Thorpe, who is the boyfriend of the boy's mother, with murder, according to CBS Chicago.

The Zion Police Department posted an update saying searchers called off the hunt Sunday evening after doing "everything humanly possible" to find Joshua Summeries.

His mother's boyfriend, Thorpe, 26, was charged Saturday with first-degree murder and ordered held on $5 million bond in the infant's death.

According to CBS Chicago, Thorpe confessed to authorities that he went to settle the crying child and accidentally suffocated him. After realizing the baby was dead, Thorpe put the baby in a backpack and threw him in a dumpster.

Thorpe reportedly told his girlfriend that the child had been kidnapped and when the mother asked him why he didn't call police, he fled.

The station reports police said Thorpe went back to the garbage can, removed the backpack with the body of the child and dropped it at a different location where a garbage truck was closer to picking it up.

Prosecutors say they have surveillance video of him putting the bag in a trash bin.

Police officers, trained cadaver search dogs and volunteer members of the Illinois and Wisconsin National Guard helped with the landfill search.

WBBM interviewed the biological father of the child, who thanked officials and volunteers for all their help.

The mother of the child has reportedly been cooperating with authorities.


http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-57600241-504083/joshua-summeries-update-demetries-thorpe-ill-man-charged-with-murder-in-case-of-missing-infant/