UPDATE 10/17/08 – Yesterday, Christopher Mikels and Douglas Mandichak were indicted by a Camden County grand jury for the first-degree murder of Felicia Mikels, 17, on January 18. Mikels, who was Felicia’s uncle and lived in the same house with her, is the alleged father of Felicia’s child.  The baby, Miciana, who was six weeks old, was found unharmed on a stranger’s lawn January 19. Felicia’s body was found in Pennsauken Creek in Maple Shade on May 2. Both men remain held on $750,000 and $1 million bonds respectively.
Pennsauken, N.J., January 21, 2008 – When Felicia Mikels, 17, didn’t come home on Friday night, her family was worried. It wasn’t like Felicia to stay gone, and she’d left the house on foot with her five-week-old baby Miciana in her stroller. By early Saturday morning, they were frantic and contacted police to file a missing persons report.
Saturday morning in neighboring Cherry Hill, a man was driving to work when he saw a Winnie The Pooh carseat on the front lawn. Inside was a newborn baby girl – cold and hungry, but otherwise unharmed. She was bundled in pink blankets. The man called police, who sent out press releases to area news outlets publicizing the abandoned baby, hoping for leads.
Within hours, pieces started to fall into place. Family members saw the baby on TV and rushed to the police station to collect Miciana – but there was no sign of Felicia. It wasn’t like her, they insisted. She took pictures of her baby every day even though she was young and single. She loved her baby, wouldn’t leave her. Detectives spent hours interviewing family to collect leads – and they got one.
Felicia’s paternal uncle, 26 year old Christopher Mikels, showed authorities a text message from Felicia’s cell phone. The text indicated that Felicia had run away, but something about the message didn’t seem right to investigators. They kept Chris there to ask a few more questions, and his story just didn’t add up. Until later that night, when he came clean.
Felicia was upset about a money dispute with him and his friend Douglas Mandichak, 25. She’d met the men at a local bowling alley near her home Friday night and had Miciana with her. Mikels and Mandichak took Felicia for a little ride “just to scare her”, Mikels said, but when they got to a parking lot in Pennsauken, something went wrong. Mikels said he’d held Felicia while Mandichak hit her in the head with a piece of wood. They drove around for awhile, then dumped Felicia’s body in Pennsauken Creek. They left the stroller on the bank, he said, but he couldn’t kill baby Miciana.
Douglas Mandichak
After all, said Uncle Chris, Miciana was probably his daughter. He’d been having sex with his teenaged niece for quite some time. And if not his baby, then quite possibly Doug Mandichak’s. What’s a little sexual abuse of a minor and incest in the face of murder?
Can I just stop here and get a giant WTF? Even Camden County Prosecutor Joshua M. Ottenberg said, “There seems to have been a serious breakdown in the rules of humanity” in this case. Oh, really, Captain Obvious? And I don’t think this was a money dispute, either, unless the money he meant was child support.
Divers spent Sunday combing Pennsauken Creek for Felicia’s body, but haven’t yet found it. They did recover the stroller on the banks of the creek where it was dumped, though. And Mikels and Mandichak are in jail in lieu of $750,000 bond. Mandichak is charged with murder and Mikels is charged with accomplice to murder. DNA testing is being done on both men to determine which total waste of humanity is poor little Miciana’s father.
UPDATE 4/29/08 – Three months later, Felicia Mikels’ body has been found. It washed up on the banks of Pennsauken Creek this afternoon and was spotted by passersby. After removing her body from the creek bank in Maple Shade, it was determined that the body is Felicia’s. An autopsy is scheduled for Wednesday morning.
Also today, both Christopher Mikels and Douglas Mandichak were in court briefly, where new bonds were set. Mandichak, who is accused of the actual murder of Felicia Mikels, is now being held on $1 million bail. Christopher Mikels, who is being charged as an accomplice, remains held on $750,000 bond. DNA testing still isn’t in, but each man has said that he could be Miciana’s father.
On May 2, 2008, authorities confirmed that the body pulled from the creek on April 29 does belong to Felicia Mikels.
I’ll continue updating this article as information comes in.
Tags: Incest, Missing Person, Murder, Rape
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