By Chuck Hustmyre
February 12, 2007
FRENCH SETTLEMENT, La. (Crime Library) — Sheriff's deputies in Livingston Parish on Saturday booked convicted kidnapper Mark Sterling Lewis with one count of second-degree murder for allegedly killing 13-year-old Kaitlin Aydell.
Searchers found Kaitlin's body on Feb. 3 partially submerged in a bayou in neighboring Ascension Parish. The seventh grader had been missing for two days after having last been seen getting off of a school bus in the afternoon and walking home.
Her mother spoke to her by telephone shortly after Kaitlin got home, but when she called her daughter again a little while later, Kaitlin didn't answer. Her mother became concerned and went home to check on Kaitlin but couldn't find her.
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| Kaitlin Aydell |
Police and volunteers spent two days searching in ever-widening circles in and around this rural bayou community until two searchers finally made the grim discovery more than 48 hours after Kaitlin disappeared.
An autopsy found she had been strangled.
The killing shocked those who live in the quiet village of 900 people.
"If this was Baton Rouge, then I might expect something like this, but this is French Settlement," resident Sonya Akridge told The Advocate newspaper. "Things like this don't happen here. They just don't."
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Body of Missing 13-Year-Old Kaitlin Aydell Found
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