An Amber Alert for a missing Missouri boy has been cancelled, but there is no good news to report in the case of 6-year-old Markell Beasley. The little boy is dead in an apparent murder-suicide. So is his mother's ex-boyfriend, a man who helped raise him and gave little Markell his last name.
Like the large percentage of abductions, Markell's was what's known as a non-stranger abduction. His mother, Michelle Gelling, had allowed him to go to what she thought was a Christmas gathering with the family of her ex-boyfriend Demetrius Beasley.
Only it turns out there was no Christmas party, and the Beasleys had turned the little boy over to Demetrius. When Gelling reported her son missing, she believed he was with her ex-boyfriend, who she said was making threats to her via text and phone, warning her he would not return her son.
Cops believe Demetrius Beasley actually killed his ex-girlfriend's son before turning the gun on himself on Wednesday.
I can't help thinking about the members of Beasley's family who helped him get hold of this little boy. Did they know what he was planning? I can't imagine they did. No one in their right mind would set something like this up if they could foresee a loved one dying OR a child dying ... forget both happening.
Demetrius was not the boy's father and apparently did not have any legal rights to custody. Still, he clearly had a vested interest in the child and whatever issue he had to work out should have been left to him and Gelling. Sticking your nose into someone else's custody issues can never end well.
This family will have a LOT weighing on their conscience for years to come.
What do you think should happen with the family here? Should they be charged for helping Beasley?
Image via Missouri State Highway Patrol