Barefoot And In PJs: Carlee Morse, 16, Disappears *deceased*

[Dakota Valkyrie]

A Westland mother needs your help to find her missing daughter Carlee.

16-year-old Carlee Morse disappeared from her Westland apartment around midnight on August 20.

Her mother tells Action News she gave Carlee permission to go outside and
make a quick phone call. When Carlee didn't come back inside, her mother reported her missing to Westland police.

Carlee's mother says she does not believe her daughter is a runaway. She says she went outside without shoes, money or a change of clothes.

http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/region/...ssing-daughter

Westland police classified Carlee as a missing person in an active investigation. "We've received quite a few tips on her whereabouts, but at this stage of the game, nothing has panned out," said police Sgt. Steve Bird.
[...]

On the night she disappeared, Carlee stepped outside just after midnight barefoot and in her pajamas to talk on the phone and never returned, said her mother, who added that her daughter did not have any money, clothes, purse or extra clothing with her.

Since her disappearance, her cell phone has not been active. Additionally, none of her friends or family has seen or heard from her, the girl's mother said.

http://www.freep.com/article/2010112...-Westland-teen

Carlee stepped outside her apartment building, near the corner of Warren and Venoy, on Aug. 20 just after midnight with her mother's permission, a 10-minute time limit and no shoes, Morse said.

Carlee made an unanswered phone call, but left no voice-mail message for the recipient.

Realizing her daughter had not returned after about an hour, Morse called Carlee's cell phone, which went straight to voice mail.

Morse went to the police station about 2 a.m., she said, but was told to wait to file a missing persons report and give Carlee time to come home.

When the girl didn't return, Morse said she filed the report that evening, about 9 p.m.

Morse said she tried in vain during those early hours and days to convince police that her daughter is not a runaway.

"By the third week, the officer said to me, 'This is strange — a typical runaway would have made contact before this amount of time,'" Morse said.

http://www.detnews.com/article/20101...-Westland-teen

Find Carlee Morse: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?...4554607&v=wall
Find Carlee: http://findcarlee.com/

[Whisper]

I didnt even know this thread was here
This is big news here,they recieved a tip and have arrested 2 guys she knew but still no idea why they murdered her
They have admitted to killing her

Two people under arrest in Westland teen's murder; victim missing since August

WESTLAND, Mich. - Westland police say two men are under arrest in connection with the death of 16-year-old Carlee Morse.
[...]
She was considered a runaway, and police say there was never any evidence of a crime until a tip was phoned in on Thursday.

"I believe it was just they had information and it had been wearing on them and they finally decided to come clean and tell the authorities what they knew," said Westland Police Chief Alan Ramsden.

The two people in custody are a 19-year-old from Westland and a 22-year-old from Taylor. Police say the two men have confessed, and are expected to be charged with homicide soon.

Police have not been able to find Carlee's body, but they are working on leads. They believe she was killed shortly after she disappeared.

Investigators tell Action News the three were acquaintances, and it looks like the crime had something to do with money.

http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/region/...g-since-august

[Rawrehz]

Horrible for such a pretty young girl to get killed though but I am glad to know her mother can have some answers she was looking for. Hopefully these douche buckets will spill all the beans so they can lay her to rest...

Awful.

[Whisper]

Yeah now they are looking for her body
As of early this morning news was they had searched where the guys had said they dumped her
Within hours of her walking outside she was dead
Ill see on news at 6 if they have found her yet

[Dakota Valkyrie]

No body yet.

Westland police said 16-year-old Carly Jade Morse was strangled to death by two men.

A 19-year-old man from Taylor and a 22-year-old man from Canton were arrested after they told police that they killed Morse by strangling her, police said.
[...]

Police said it is likely Morse was killed just an hour after she left her apartment that day. Police believe the two men who confessed to killing her were people she considered friends.

Morse's stepfather, Patrick Maloy, said he helped raise her.

"Carly was a spirit and a half," Maloy said. "She had a glow about her."
[...]

The investigation into a group of Morse's friends connected to the two killers also continues, police said. The men will be charged soon.

"If you knew Carly, it's just not right," Maloy said.

http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/26101177/detail.html

[Dakota Valkyrie]

Frustrated family slams cops:

The former stepfather of a 16-year-old girl missing since Aug. 20 and now presumed dead has harsh words for the Westland Police Department even though detectives say they have two men in custody who confessed to strangling the teen.

What's more, he said, detectives have told the family that the two men won't reveal the body's location.
[...]

When Morse tried to report her missing an hour later, she said officers told her to give Carlee time to return and that the girl likely had run away.

"The whole thing has been fouled up," Malloy, 45, of Garden City said of the investigation. "It has been a mess."

Malloy said Lori Morse contacted him about a week after Carlee had been gone and asked him to help find her.

He said he checked around and spoke to people who said there were rumors linking the suspects now in custody to Carlee's disappearance and that the information was passed along to investigators who "didn't act fast enough."
[...]

Malloy said he was present when investigators told his ex-wife that the suspects confessed to killing her daughter about an hour after her family knew she was gone and that they believed the men's account of what happened.

But the suspects didn't say where her body was, something that worries Malloy.

"They confessed, but the police can't get the body's location? These guys (the suspects) aren't rocket scientists," Malloy said.

http://www.detnews.com/article/20101...326/1408/local

[Whisper]

Carlee Morse's Mother Speaks Out

WESTLAND, Mich. (WJBK) - Two men have allegedly confessed and been charged with killing a missing teenage girl from Westland. Now, her grieving mother wants a critical piece of information from those men.
"She was so cute, funny, family oriented, artistic, just a jokester," said Lori Morse.

Carlee Morse was a beautiful 16-year-old girl with her whole life in front of her. That all changed the night of august 19, 2010.
"She said, 'Mom, can I go outside?' And I said, '10 minutes, Carlee.' And she's like, 'Yes, mom. I know.' And she went outside," Morse said.

That's the last time Morse saw her daughter. She dozed off for an hour and says when she woke up, she realized Carlee never came home.
She immediately reported her daughter missing at the Westland Police Department.
"The officer said, 'Kids do this all the time. Why don't you just give her some time. She'll come back home,'" said Morse.

However, Carlee never did. Three months passed and then the news Lori Morse never wanted to hear.
"I saw the chaplain walk in. I heard, 'We've arrested two people,' and that's the last thing I heard," Morse said.
Police would tell her and her family that two men, 22-year-old Nicholas Cottrell and 19-year-old Justin Yoshikawa confessed to killing Carlee, strangling her to death one hour after she went missing that summer night around the same time Lori Morse reported her daughter's disappearance to police.

"Thank God for shock because I believe shock is the only thing that has me functioning," said Morse.
What is so troubling, Yoshikawa was considered a close friend of Carlee's.
"Adored -- thought he was the greatest kid we had ever met. We were happy when Carlee was hanging around with him," Morse said.
Although both men have allegedly admitted they killed Carlee and have been charged with first-degree murder, they won't tell police the whereabouts of her body. Morse just learned police are getting closer to finding her, telling her they have narrowed it down to the city.

"If the parents are able to talk to these boys, just get us our daughter. That's what we want. We want her. Talk sense to them. Make them say where she is so that this can be over," said Morse.

And so, Morse says, she can finally bury her daughter in peace in her home state of Tennessee where Carlee one day hoped to live.
Morse says once they get their closure, they plan to move. Living here is just too painful.
"There's too many memories here. Like I said, everywhere I go, there's Carlee. I should be Christmas shopping for Carlee, not planning a memorial and not trying to plan a funeral. There's no tree. There's no holiday spirit here," Morse said.
The family really wants to give Carlee a proper burial once her body is located and transport it to Tennessee, but they can't afford to do it. They desperately need the public to donate money so they can make that happen.
[...]

http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news...her-speaks-out

Lori Morse.

[FknKraze]

Wow! I can't imagine what this Mommy is going through, I have a daughter around the same age, her name is Karlee and her birthday is August 19th, the same day Carlee went missing, too many coincidences for my liking. R.I.P. Carlee

[Whisper]

Woman charged in Westland murder case

Dec. 18--A Westland woman has been charged in connection with the apparent killing of 16-year-old Carlee Jade Morse, who has been missing since August.

Maria Miller, spokeswoman with the Wayne County Prosecutor's Office, said Tina Lowe was charged Saturday with accessory after the fact, a felony, and misdemeanor interfering with a police investigation. Her preliminary exam hearing is scheduled for Dec. 21 in 34th District Court in Romulus.

Earlier this week, Justin Lee Yoshikawa, 19, and Nicholas Jay Cottrell, 22, were both charged with first-degree murder, a felony punishable by up to life in prison, for killing Carlee Jade. Authorities have said Yoshikawa and Cottrell admitted to killing the girl after a witness came forward Dec. 9 and provided police with information that led to their arrests.
[...]

http://dailyme.com/story/20101218000...rder-case.html

[Whisper]

Im waiting for news update b/ this just happened and shes apparently one of the boys mom but not sure which one yet

[Dakota Valkyrie]

I can't think of anything that would cause me to be an "accessory after the fact" if a kid of mine did something like this. I'd be more likely to turn them in (and donate the reward to charity).

[Whisper]

I can't think of anything that would cause me to be an "accessory after the fact" if a kid of mine did something like this. I'd be more likely to turn them in (and donate the reward to charity).

nope me either,this is just breaking here and I know theres a mug b/c showed it on news break but I cant find it

[Whisper]

nope me either,this is just breaking here and I know theres a mug b/c showed it on news break but I cant find it

WESTLAND, Mich. (WJBK) - Two men have allegedly confessed and been charged with killing a missing teenage girl from Westland. Now, the mother of one of the suspects also faces charges in connection with the crime. Tina Marie Lowe, 49, is accused of interfering with the police investigation into the murder of Carlee Morse.
[...]
Lowe is the mother of Nicholas Cotrell, 22. He and Justin Yoshikawa, 19, are accused of murdering Morse. Both men told police they strangled her. Her body has not yet been found. Westland Police believe Cotrell's mother not only knew about the killing but she interfered with the police investigation. Sources tell Fox 2 on at least one occasion she sent a text message to a witness asking them not to give information to police. She faces a misdemeanor charge of interfering with a police investigation and accessory to a felony. She could get up to 5 years in prison.

http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news...her-speaks-out

Tina Lowe accused of interfering with police

[Whisper]

Theres video at last link of Carlees family talking about this latest arrest
Her parents had implored the biys parents to help to get the boys to talk and now she knew all along,allegedly

[Rawrehz]

SO unfortunatley these asshats live in a state where the death penalty is not an option but hopefully life with no parole is...


19-year-old Justin Yoshikawa


22-year-old Nicholas Cottrell

[evil bastard]

Looks like there are going to be two new butt brothers on D-block.

[walkingeagle]

Sources tell Fox 2 on at least one occasion she sent a text message to a witness asking them not to give information to police. She faces a misdemeanor charge of interfering with a police investigation and accessory to a felony.

Looks like they should add witness tampering also!

[Dakota Valkyrie]

What happened to Carlee revealed!

The family of Carlee Jade Morse, 16, now knows how she died, but they might never know where her body is.

One of two men charged in her death testified that he participated Aug. 19 as he watched his best friend strangle her.

Details of the homicide were revealed Thursday during a preliminary examination of the evidence against Justin Lee Yoshikawa, 19, of Westland before 18th District Judge Sandra Ference Cicirelli.
[...]

Nicholas Jay Cottrell, 22, of Taylor, also charged in the death, took a plea deal to testify against Yoshikawa for the prosecution.

Cottrell is facing 25 to 50 years in prison. The deal reduced a first-degree murder charge to second degree. First-degree murder is punishable by life in prison without parole.

According to testimony, Yoshikawa started dating Morse in the spring of 2010 and they broke up on bad terms. Yoshikawa said in a written confession that Morse physically assaulted him and they broke up during the summer.

Cottrell said he had only known Yoshikawa for about six months when Yoshikawa devised a plan to kill Morse.

The plan, he said, was to get Morse to come out of her apartment and get into Cottrell's 1998 Ford Escort to smoke marijuana. Yoshikawa was to be hiding underneath clothes and cardboard in the back seat.
[...]

Cottrell said he and the girl drove to a desolate spot and when a certain song from a CD they were listening to came on, Yoshikawa rose out of the back seat and put a rope he'd used to walk his dog around Morse's neck as she sat in the passenger seat.

After driving for about an hour, they put Morse's body in the trunk and went home and parked in a garage.

The next night, Yoshikawa went into the garage alone and put Morse's body into garbage bags, Cottrell said.

Cottrell said it was after 11 p.m. when they drove south on a freeway for an hour or two looking for a spot to dump Morse's body.

"He just wanted me to get rid of the body," Cottrell said. "He wanted to throw it somewhere."

They ended up behind a red brick church. Cottrell said that because of drugs and shock he doesn't have any recollection of where the church is.

He said he remembers the words "Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit."

"I handed him my keys and he opened my trunk and I saw him carrying a trash bag," Cottrell said. "He carried it toward the Dumpster and dropped it in and closed the lid."

Cottrell said he told his girlfriend about the murder, and she told a friend. Eventually, somebody told police.

Cottrell was arrested Dec. 9 during a traffic stop in Taylor.

When police brought Yoshikawa in Dec. 10, he confessed to killing Morse.

"I have had a while to think about what I have done," Yoshikawa wrote in a confession. "I killed another person and her name was Carlee."

Cottrell said he believed Yoshikawa intended to kill Lori Morse, as well.

"He told me that after the fact," Cottrell said.

He also said that Yoshikawa has killed other people. He said he didn't previously tell police because he was afraid of Yoshikawa.

Yoshikawa told police during his confession that he killed other people, but that line of questioning was not pursued during testimony.

Yoshikawa has been bound over for trial. He is to be arraigned before Wayne County Circuit Judge Ulysses Boykin at 9 a.m. Thursday.

Cottrell pleaded guilty Jan. 10 to second-degree murder. He is scheduled to be sentenced in Wayne County Circuit Court at 9 a.m. Jan. 26.

Cottrell's mother, Tina Marie Lowe of Belleville, is charged with accessory after the fact. She waived her preliminary examination and will be arraigned Thursday in Wayne County Circuit Court.

http://www.heritage.com/articles/201...1707629454.txt

[FknKraze]

WOW! I am glad Yoshikawa, the little fucking, serial killer in training, is removed from society but Carlee especially, Cottrell and his Mother, what a fucking, pointless, unnecessary, waste, of three peoples lives, not to mention Lori Morse, who's life is most likely, irreparably destroyed. FUCK!

[Whisper]

I watched this live the other day here when he was on the stand blaming the other guy
And I have absolutely no clue how the family sat through him descibing "snapping her neck" and the other stuff they did to her
And about her body,he knows where they dumped it b/c its not that far out of where they took her from
One attorney said the same thing,they did more to her body most likely and dont wanna be held accountable for more then they are already facing

[Gidget]

I wonder if that kid would have had a better memory if somebody had thought to tell him that there would be no plea deal without a body.

[Dakota Valkyrie]

Why is she dead and where is she now?

Those were the questions Carlee Morse's mother and sister begged Nicholas Cottrell to answer at his sentencing Thursday in Wayne County Circuit Court.

Cottrell offered no answers, saying only that he feared his alleged partner, Justin Yoshikawa.

"I would be dead also" he said -- and even that was against his lawyer's advice.

Cottrell, 22, was sentenced to 25-50 years in prison for second-degree murder as part of a plea deal with the Wayne County Prosecutor's Office to testify against Yoshikawa. Cottrell admitted to helping strangle Carlee, 16, whose broken body was stuffed into a trash bag and tossed away last summer. Her body still hasn't been found.

"I believe you know where she is," Lori Morse, Carlee's mother, implored Cottrell. "You need to do the right thing. She doesn't need to be left in trash and garbage."

Lauren Morse, Carlee's 23-year-old sister, said she and her mother "pleaded and begged," with Cottrell so that they could finally lay Carlee's body to rest, but got only silence.

"Heinous crime" is a parsed phrase in law school, Judge Ulysses Boykin said, but this case is the ghastly reality of the law school lectures.

"Words fail me at this time," he told Cottrell. "It is almost inconceivable that you could be a participant ... in this murder."
[...]

The girl's body was then broken up -- Cottrell's lawyer Solomon Radner corrected the presentence report to say the girl wasn't "cut into little pieces," but was instead disjointed to fit into a trash bag -- and dumped at an unknown church.

Radner also said Cottrell, who has bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, "was scared to death" by Yoshikawa.

Cottrell's mother, Tina Lowe, who is charged with being an accessory after the fact, attended the sentencing but did not speak.

To keep silent for months, Lauren Morse said, "That's trash. Completely, nasty, trash."

http://www.freep.com/article/2011020...n-girl-s-death

[Whisper]

I watched him on the news the other night and you can tell it was rehearsed
I would bet my house his lawyer wrote it out had him memorize it and say it b.c there was no feeling of remorse what so ever
He just looked down and tried to convince everyone he was threatened too
He looked and sounded like a fucking robot

[Rockin Ma]

The girl's body was then broken up -- Cottrell's lawyer Solomon Radner corrected the presentence report to say the girl wasn't "cut into little pieces," but was instead disjointed to fit into a trash bag -- and dumped at an unknown church.

That makes all the difference then jack wad.

[Whisper]

This guys a real prize hes got a haircut like Alfalfa from the Little Rascals only Alfalfa was cute

[Dakota Valkyrie]

On the third day of his jury trial for murdering Westland teenager Carlee Morse, Justin Yoshikawa accepted a plea bargain that will send him to prison for 35 to 65 years.

Yoshikawa, who turned 20 in July, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder which gives him the possibility of parole. Had he been convicted as charged of first-degree murder, Yoshikawa would have faced a mandatory sentence of life in prison without chance of parole.

Before Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Ulysses Boykin accepted the plea, Yoshikawa was asked about his role in the murder by his attorney George Chedraue and prosecutor Lisa Screen.

Responding to questions, Yoshikawa confirmed that he and co-defendant Nicholas Cottrell lured Morse, 16, from her family's Westland apartment late Aug. 19 or early Aug. 20, 2010.

Describing Morse as someone he dated briefly during the summer of 2010, Yoshikawa responded “Yes, sir” when asked if he hid in the back seat of a car before strangling front seat passenger Morse and later placing her body in trash bags.

The court testimony mirrors the statements given by Yoshikawa and Cottrell after their arrests in December 2010.

Yoshikawa's plea comes on the heels of Cottrell, who entered a plea bargain earlier this year with the condition of testifying against Yoshikawa, taking the stand and refusing to testify.

Cottrell, 23, had also been charged with first-degree murder but was sentenced to 25-50 years in prison after pleading guilty to second-degree murder.

Going against the advice of his defense attorney Solomon Radner, Cottrell refused to testify, telling Boykin that his plea had been the result of coercion by Westland police. Cottrell said he had lied when he had earlier testified the plea was coerced. Boykin is scheduled to hear arguments in Cottrell's efforts to withdraw his guilty plea on Dec. 12.

After it was clear that Cottrell would not testify, Boykin allowed the transcript of Cottrell's testimony from Yoshikawa's preliminary examination in Westland's 18th District Court to be read into the record. Screen and Chedraue read their parts of the transcript with a stand-in for Cottrell.

“We were about three-quarters done reading Nick's (Cottrell) testimony on Tuesday. Justin (Yoshikawa) knew the rest of it would be read,” said Westland Police Sgt. Dan Serrano, the officer in charge of the case. “Justin saw the looks on the faces of the jurors. He started to hear the ice cracking under his feet.”

Morse's mother Laurie and older sister Lauren were consulted before the plea agreement was accepted. Family and supporters of Yoshikawa were taken outside the courtroom by Chedraue before the plea was entered.
[...]

Yoshikawa, a former Westland John Glenn High School student, is scheduled to be sentenced by Boykin on Dec. 15.

Morse's body has not been located. Yoshikawa and Cottrell told police that they were smoking marijuana and driving around randomly before placing her body into a Dumpster outside a church.

“This is the first murder case in Westland where there was no body. We had no witnesses and no crime scene,” said Serrano. “These are things that you hold up (for convictions). We only had investigative reports.”

http://www.hometownlife.com/article/...WS24/111270441

[princessgrandma]

God, it would mess me up bad if I found out someone did this to one of my daughters and then wouldn't tell where her body was. That is just beyond inhuman. I don't think either one of them should have gotten a plea deal. Too bad the DP couldn't be considered.