A ten-year-old girl was found dead in a car trunk in New Jersey after she went missing from her home for more than a week.
Jalayshia 'Malayshia' Allford lived in West Philadelphia with a foster family and was last seen at her home on October 26.
The woman claimed she filed a missing person report after Allford did not return home from school that day, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
She then called Allford's aunt Yolanda Brown and said that her biological mother had taken Allford.
The authorities contacted the mother and did not find the child with her, the outlet reported.
Police quickly established that the child 'may be at special risk of harm or injury' after this discovery, ABC 6 reported.
On Thursday, the police found Allford's body inside a car parked at the Stonington Court Apartments in Lindenwold, New Jersey, approximately 20 miles away from her home.
The suspect was arrested by the police but their name has not yet been released.
Jalayshia 'Malayshia' Allford, 10, went missing from her foster home in West Philadelphia on October 26
Her body was found after more than a week in a car trunk parked the Stonington Court Apartments in Lindenwold, New Jersey
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Philadelphia police, FBI agents and community members initially focused their search efforts in a field near the house, officials said.
However, they only found the body of an animal in the forest.
Deputy Police Commissioner Frank Vanore looked at surveillance videos and saw Allford returning from school on October 22.
She was never seen on that block again, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
Brown claimed that the little girl went missing that very day because she was told that Allford did not attend school that Friday or Monday.
The aunt alleged that the foster mother waited for four days to report the child missing.
Authorities said there were inconsistencies in the foster mother's statement and timeline of events, the outlet reported.
Officials did not reveal the cause of her death.
The suspect was arrested by the police and the charges against the suspect for the girl's 'brutal murder' will be announced today
Jalayshia's biological father, Nazir Allford, told ABC 6 earlier that he was finding it difficult to cope that his daughter went missing.
'All I'm concerned with is my child. I'm not concerned about nothing else,' he said.
The father had previously pleaded guilty to charges related to interference with child custody, according to court records.
Relatives told the outlet that he only wanted the best for his daughter.
'He loved his daughter. His daughter loved him. We're vouching for that as a family because we know that,' Nafis Horne, Jalayshia's uncle, said.
Nazir said he had been trying hard to get custody of his daughter after she got into the foster system a few years ago.
The Philadelphia police will hold a press conference at 5.30pm today to announce charges against a suspect for the girl's 'brutal murder.'
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