The suspect is known to the victim’s family.
**Content warning: Details of violence and sexual assault may be distressing to some readers.
A 14-year-old boy has been charged with the murder of a 10-year-old girl whose body was found near a wooded walking trail in Wisconsin.
Lily Peters was on her way back from her aunt’s house on Sunday but never made it home.
Her father reported her missing that night, with police finding her bike on a walking trail in the woods near her aunt’s house hours later.
The girl’s body was found near the trail at around 9.15 AM the next morning, Chippewa Falls police say.
By Tuesday evening, an arrest had been made.
The suspect, an unnamed 14-year-old boy who was known to Lily’s family, made his first appearance in court on Wednesday, ABC News reports.
Prosecutors claim the teen intended to “rape and kill the victim from the get-go”, with the boy allegedly having told police that he punched her in the stomach, hit her with a stick, knocked her to the ground and strangled her “to the point of death” prior to sexually assaulting her, according to the outlet.
The teen remains in custody at a juvenile detention centre, where he will have no contact with any other juveniles.
He is due back in court on May 5.
