Baby found in car at Barnes-Jewish Hospital
A baby kidnapped by a man who killed her father and stole his borrowed sport utility vehicle spent about eight hours alone after the vehicle was abandoned outside Barnes-Jewish Hospital, officials said Tuesday.
St. Louis County police were trying to identify the killer and his motive. It remained unclear whether the dead man, Tionna Roach, 31, was a random victim or the intended target of murder.
Police and court records indicated that he had a past conviction for drug trafficking.
The shooting occurred about 10:30 p.m. Monday in the Lucas Hunt Village apartments, just northwest of Interstate 70 and Lucas & Hunt Road, in unincorporated St. Louis County.
County police said Roach had borrowed the blue 2000 Lincoln Navigator from a relative and driven to the apartments with his daughter to meet a friend, but was shot before he got there.
The friend was among those who heard shots outside his building, in the 7200 block of Burrwood Drive, said Officer Rick Eckhard.
Eckhard said several witnesses reported they heard shots and saw a man drive away in the Navigator. Ivory Roach, 10 months old, was still inside.
The St. Louis Area Regional Amber Alert broadcast a plea for help in finding the infant and SUV at 12:30 a.m. Tuesday.
A Barnes-Jewish hospital employee, who had heard broadcast appeals for the baby, noticed the Navigator — with the child still inside — shortly before 7 a.m. Tuesday and called authorities. The girl was reported to be in good condition and was staying with relatives.
Roach’s aunt, Wilma Elliott of Olivette said the entire family was relieved to learn that Ivory was found unharmed Tuesday morning.
“I had been praying all night,” Elliott said. “I was having nightmares that they had killed her.”
The vehicle was parked in a spot reserved for Barnes-Jewish maternity patients, at Euclid Avenue and Barnes-Jewish Plaza. Authorities said a hospital surveillance camera first recorded the Navigator at 10:53 p.m. Monday, less than a half-hour after the killing.
Eckhard said Roach and the baby’s mother had lived previously in Lucas Hunt Village, and that Roach had primary custody of the child. Police reported finding several recent addresses for Roach. The relative who lent him the Navigator lives elsewhere in North County.
Elliott said her nephew had recently moved out of the Lucas Hunt Village complex and was there Monday night to collect some of his belongings. She said he attended classes at St. Louis Community College at Forest Park and worked hard to provide for his daughter.
“He wasn’t perfect, but he was a good father and he was trying,” Elliott said. “Nobody’s perfect, but he was trying. He was a good family person and concerned about the people in his family.”
On Tuesday afternoon, police made an appeal to speak to the driver of a late-model black Dodge Magnum with Illinois license plates that was seen on Burrwood near the time of the killing. Eckhard said detectives hope that motorist saw something helpful.
Eckhard said Tionna Roach had a record of drug convictions. St. Louis County Circuit Court files list a Tionne Roach, with the same date of birth, who pleaded guilty in July 2002 of drug trafficking, possessing controlled substances and unlawful use of a weapon, and was sentenced to five years in prison. Roach was paroled in March 2004.
source: stl today
