Skeletal Remains Found In Louisiana Identified As Those Of Missing Las Vegas Girl

That poor family. I have a strange feeling they will never find the girl’s mother. Who would have thought she’d end up all the way in LA?

Nowadays, it’s a good idea to check someone’s background and history before allowing them to get even close to your kids and family. If they get offended, show them the door.

If one’s dead so is the other one. God please let me be wrong. My sincere condolences to the family.

I guess it’s possible she’s on the run with the guy, but my first impression was that she’s dead too. Women need to make damned sure who they’re spending time with before they go on road trips!

Not sure if its applicable in this case but but in general its trajic how sooo many single moms these days hook up with shady guys they know little about and bring em around their kids too..
Moms need to be more prudent and insightful about lousy decision making when it comes to choosing male partners who can (lethally) impact not only them but their kids lives as well..

Weird twist to the story

Man declared dead in 1994 wanted for kidnapping

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A man declared dead 16 years ago but who authorities say is alive is charged with kidnapping a 12-year-old Nevada girl whose remains were found in Louisiana, officials said Thursday.
A warrant was issued for 53-year-old Thomas Steven Sanders. It charges him with abducting Lexis Roberts whose remains were found by hunters in east-central Louisiana in early October. Relatives told investigators the girl and her mother had known Sanders for two or three months, said Robert King, the FBI agent in Alexandria heading up the investigation.

In 1994, family members legally declared Sanders dead in Mississippi.
“He just walked away one day and never came back,” King said. “So after seven years the family had him declared dead.”
However, on Sept. 3, officials said security cameras showed Sanders buying ammunition at a Wal-Mart in Las Vegas. Lexis suffered multiple gunshot wounds and federal agents said the ammunition Sanders purchased was consistent with the caliber weapon used in her homicide.
Sheriff’s officials in Arizona’s Coconino County told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that the girl was seen Sept. 4 with her mother, Suellen Roberts, and Sanders at the Bearizona Drive-Thru Wildlife Park off Interstate 40 in Williams, Ariz.
Authorities also do not know what has become of her mother, who is missing, King said.
Sanders is described as 5-foot-8 inches tall and weighing 200 pounds or more. He has a criminal record, including crimes involving children, King said.
Investigators are still trying to piece his history together because he was only discovered to be alive since the girl disappeared.
[...]
Sanders was last seen driving a silver 2001 Kia Spectra with damage on the passenger side. It may have Nevada plates, or stolen plates, officials said.

http://www.dailyrecord.com/article/20101104/UPDATES01/101104093/Man-declared-dead-in-1994-wanted-for-kidnapping-

Declared dead suspect wants indictment thrown out

Attorneys for a man who was declared dead and later charged in the kidnapping and killing of a Las Vegas girl have asked a judge to dismiss one of the indictments against him.
Thomas Steven Sanders was declared dead in Mississippi in 1994 after he abandoned his family seven years earlier. He surfaced years later as suspect in the deaths of 12-year-old Lexis Roberts, whose body was found Oct. 8, 2010, by hunters in Louisiana’s Catahoula Parish, and her mother, 31-year-old Suellen Roberts, whose body was found the next month in northwestern Arizona’s Yavapai County.
Sanders was indicted in Louisiana in November 2010, charged with kidnapping resulting in the child’s death. A second indictment in January 2011 added the charge of using a gun in a crime resulting in death.
Sanders attorneys asked U.S. District Judge Dee Drell during a hearing Thursday to dismiss the second indictment. They claim it creates the situation of double jeopardy because both charges could result in the death penalty and arise from the same crime. The attorneys also said the second indictment, known as a superseding indictment, should be dismissed on statute of limitations grounds because it wasn’t filed within 30 days of Sanders being charged.
Prosecutors said the superseding indictment is valid and should not be dismissed. They also said that double jeopardy protects against a second prosecution for the same offense after acquittal or conviction and multiple punishments for the same offense.
“As an initial matter, at this stage of the proceeding, defendant has not yet been convicted of either count and is not about to be punished for anything,” prosecutors said.
The judge said he would rule later on the arguments.
Advertise | AdChoicesAdvertise | AdChoicesAdvertise | AdChoices
Sanders has pleaded not guilty to killing the child. The trial is scheduled for Jan. 14. Arizona and Louisiana authorities have also said he will face state charges.
Investigators said Sanders confessed to the killings and helped direct them to the mother’s body, according to court records. His attorneys have asked for that information to be withheld as evidence because they claim he “affirmatively and unequivocally stated in response to law enforcement questions that he wanted to talk to a lawyer.”
“Despite this, the questioning of him did not cease, and counsel was not provided to him,” the defense lawyers said in court filings.
Prosecutors have argued that Sanders only wanted to talk to an attorney about certain aspects of the case.
“In this case, each time that the defendant requested an attorney, it was limited to a particular topic, and his request was scrupulously honored by the interviewing agent. The defendant’s requests were unambiguous. Nonetheless, law enforcement went a step further by confirming with the defendant that he wished to continue the interview without the advice of an attorney,” prosecutors said.
Sanders was arrested in Gulfport, Miss., in November 2010 after a massive manhunt. Authorities said Sanders and Suellen Roberts were in a relationship when they set out on a road trip for the Labor Day weekend in 2010. The last place the mother and daughter were seen alive was in Arizona.
Security footage showed Sanders buying ammunition at aWalmart in Las Vegas about a month before Lexis Robert’s body was found. The bullets he purchased were the same type that killed the girl, police said.
The mother and daughter’s disappearances worried authorities early on, but the case took a bizarre twist when investigators realized their suspect had been declared legally dead 17 years earlier.
[...]
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46455284/ns/us_news/