When 18-year-old Latisha Frazier went missing last August, her case was assigned to a homicide detective rather than the missing person’s bureau. Latisha would never run away and leave her 4-year-old daughter, her parents told police.
Family and friends say Latisha was a good mother and student, who went to school in the mornings and worked in the afternoons so she could take care of her daughter at night. Her father, Barry Campbell, often wears a t-shirt with a picture of himself and his daughter.
“It’s so sad. It’s hurtful,” he told NBC News in an interview.
Investigators say a group of 6 people — 3 men and 3 women — lured Frazier to an apartment in D.C.’s poverty-stricken Parkland neighborhood on August 4. There, police say, her hands and legs were bound together with duct tape and a bag placed over her head. The men and women took turns beating and stomping her with their fists, feet and blunt objects.
The group then put her in a closet inside the apartment. When she began to make noises, they pulled her out of the closet and beat her again. When she fell unconscious, they took a stick and poked her to see if she was still alive, then they stuffed her back in the closet for 2 days.
At some point, her body was discarded in a dumpster behind the apartment building. Her remains have never been found.
Months went by without a trace of her. Then a tip was called into the Metropolitan police department, leading detectives to believe she had been murdered.
5 people were taken into custody months after Frazier was first reported missing. The 6th suspect, 23-year-old Brian Gaither of Southeast Washington, was arrested yesterday at the same location where Frazier was murdered. He is charged with 2 counts of murder and ordered held without bail.
The defendants told detectives they believed Latisha stole money from one of them.
“Nonsense,” say Latisha’s parents. The suspects don’t work. The suspects don’t have any money. They say Latisha was the only one among them who had a job.
