JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — A woman has been indicted on a first-degree murder charge in the death of a 4-year-old boy she was babysitting in Jefferson City.
Quatavia Givens was previously charged with second-degree murder and other counts after Darnell Gray died in her care in October 2018.
A grand jury returned the new charges on Wednesday, Jefferson City police said in a news release. Besides first-degree murder, Givens is charged with child abuse or neglect, endangering the welfare of a child and abandonment of a corpse.
Givens reported the boy missing while she was babysitting him in Jefferson City. She told police he might have been abducted, prompting a week of searches before his body was found. An autopsy found he died of blunt force trauma.
Givens was free on bond. After the new charges were filed, she was arrested in St. Charles and returned to Jefferson City, where she is being held without bond at the Cole County jail.
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