Alezuana Carter was a Philadelphia missing girl found inside a home with a gunshot wound to the mouth on April 18 just before 11 p.m., ABC 6 reported. She was taken to a nearby hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
Philadelphia police last week identified and arrested a suspect in the murder of a 13-year-old girl earlier this year.
Age
She was 13 years old.
Missing
Carter had been missing since October 2020, when she was still 12, Fox 29 reported.
Thirteen-year-old Alezauna Carter, known as Libby, was found dead after being shot in her face on the 1500 block of Overington Street on April 18. Philadelphia police initially identified her as a 20-year-old woman.
“There’s nothing you can do as a parent to prepare you for something like this,” said her grandfather, William Orr. “We all live down South Philly and southwest, so I have no idea how she managed to find her way down to this neighborhood.”
Orr says his grandaughter initially ran away with some of her friends. When she was killed on the 18th, police didn’t learn her identity and notify the family until two weeks later, family members say.
Loved ones are demanding answers from police and the community.
“The fact that people know stuff and say nothing is horrible,” said a family friend who spoke at the vigil. “I don’t care about the ‘no snitches and no telling,’ I know I’m telling. I don’t care. I’m a mother first.”
Found Dead
Officers found Carter inside a home on the 1500 block of Overington Street, suffering from a gunshot wound to the mouth on April 18, 2021, around 10:58 p.m. She was transported to an area hospital, where she was later pronounced dead.
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After the murder, a witness told police Rodriguez came running from the crime scene saying, “I shot her, I shot her in the neck,” court documents allege. The witness also said that Rodriguez bragged and confessed on multiple occasions that he killed the girl.
Suspect Arrested
Luis Rodriguez, 25, faces multiple charges, including murder, and is being held without bail, according to ABC 6.
An arrest affidavit quotes a witness who said Rodriguez ran from the scene of Carter’s shooting, saying, “I shot her, I shot her in the neck.” The same witness said that Rodriguez bragged about killing the girl on several other occasions.
Police said surveillance video captured Rodriguez entering the home in Philadelphia’s northeastern Frankford neighborhood before the shooting and leaving afterward.
“There’s nothing you can do as a parent to prepare you for something like this,” Carter’s grandfather, William Orr, told ABC 6 in May. “We all live down South Philly and southwest, so I have no idea how she managed to find her way down to this neighborhood.”
Orr said it’s believed Carter ran away with some friends. He said that it took police two weeks to identify her after the murder and notify the family.
