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Arrested: Shane Michael Charlton (age: 41)

Reason for arrest: causing the death of his girlfriend’s (common law wife’s) daughter then trying to cover it up by burying the child in a shallow grave in the backyard and claiming she must have been kidnapped while he was sleeping

Victim’s Name: Katie Frye (age:16 months)

Where crime occurred: Titus County, Louisiana

Details: Barabara Tucker had an errand to run so  she left her 16-month old daughter Katie in the care of her common law husband Shane Michael Charlton ( there must be another story here given Katie was 16-months old and a couple usually have to be living together for a certain number of years to be considered married under common law terms; but let’s not digress). So Barbara goes off on her errand; and something goes completely haywire. Police don’t know the exact details yet. What they do know is that when Barbara returned home she found Shane Michaeal fast asleep. She went to the nursery to look in on Katie. She discovered Katie was not in her crib. Alarm bells begin to blare.

This is how we imagine the scene might have gone down

BARBARA: (UPON DISCOVERING KATIE IS NOT IN HER CRIB)

Shane! Shane! Shane wake up!

SHANE MICHAEL (WHO’S REALLY ONLY PRETENDING TO BE SLEEPING - DOING HIS BEST WAKING UP SUDDENLY ALL GROGGY AND DISORIENTED ACT)

What? What?

BARBARA

Where’s Katie? She’s not in her crib!

SHANE MICHAEL (RUBBING HIS EYES. STILL ACTING KINDA SLEEPY LIKE HE’S NOT FULLY AWARE OF ANYTHING)

Katie?

BARBARA (PANIC HEIGHTENING)

Yeah! Katie! Where is she?

SHANE MICHAEL

In her crib of course. Where else?

SHANE MICHAEL PROCEEDS TO WALK TOWARDS THE NURSERY TO SHOW THAT KATIE IS IN HER CRIB.

BARBARA (RUNNING BEHIND SHANE MICHAEL)

She’s not in her crib. I already checked. She’s not there Shane!

SHANE MICHAEL (REACHES NURSERY)

Of course she’s there.

(SHANE MICHAEL WALKS TO CRIB AND LIFTS UP BLANKET, TURNS DUMBFOUNDEDLY TO LOOK AT BARBARA.)

SHANE MICHAEL

Holy Shit! I think Katie’s been kidnapped!

Since this matter is in no way funny and we don’t want to appear to be making light of it, we’ll end the scripted dramatization here. What happened next was that Shane Michael Charlton then suggested Katie must have been kidnapped because he left her in her crib sleeping before he went to take a quick nap. Police were called. The kidnapping angle was explored. Who would kidnap little Katie. Probably her biological father. Police went looking in that direction but the biological father was found and it was determined he had not kidnapped Katie.

Just as a matter of course, to ascertain they check out every possibility, police brought in the dogs and went to search in the backyard; and according to Titus County Sheriff, Tim Ingram, they found Katie’s body almost immediately. She had been buried in a shallow grave in the back yard, her body in a garbage bag.

According to what Shane Michael Charlton allegedly told police, he gave Katie too much medication, accidentally, and she died. He panicked, put her in a garbage bag and buried her in the backyard as if burying a dead animal.

Commentary: It’s not all that easy to kill a child by giving the child too much medication. After the seventh or so teaspoon of Tylenol Kids, or whatever, you’re not so much trying to help the child feel better as trying to make little baby hush and never utter another word again; but who knows what really happened? Men make those kinds of mistakes all the time don’t they? Or is that just one of those ridiculous stereotypes? Perhaps it’s a good idea for mothers to exercise more caution in deciding to leave their boyfriends to watch their children, especially where the boyfriend is not the child’s biological father.