Arkansas Man charged with murder of teen

By Jeannie Nuss Associated Press LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) -- A western Arkansas man accused of killing a 16-year-old girl he met online and hiding her body in a blue, plastic barrel has been charged with first-degree murder. Lloyd Jones, 36, was charged Tuesday in the death of Angela Allen and is being held on a $1 million bond in the Sebastian County jail, according to court documents. He was scheduled to go before a judge Wednesday. The documents don't indicate whether Jones, who was convicted of rape in 2001, has an attorney. Allen went missing Feb. 10 after telling a relative she was going for a walk. Her body was found Friday inside the barrel on land owned by Jones' brother near Lavaca, about 15 miles east of Fort Smith. Authorities said Jones told investigators that he picked the teenager up Feb. 10 at a hospital parking lot in Van Buren and took her to the Arkansas River. Court documents allege he told investigators he decided not to take her to his home in nearby Lavaca because his girlfriends might find out. According to the documents, Jones said he was making out with Allen, but then "violently pushed her into the water and left her there" after she told him her age. Sheriff's deputies searching land owned by Jones' brother found a body and identified it as Allen using dental records. A preliminary autopsy showed she died of strangulation and that no fluid was found in her lungs. Officers tracked down Jones after finding multiple text messages on the teen's cellphone from his number, a sheriff's investigator wrote in an affidavit. Authorities discovered that Jones is a sex offender and located him by tracing the location of his cellphone. One of Jones girlfriends told authorities that Jones' clothes and shoes were covered in mud when he came home that night. Authorities arrested him last week on an assault charge in connection with Angela's disappearance. While he was in jail, authorities said, Jones' father stopped by and asked him what was going on. During the recorded visit, authorities allege that Jones asked, "Did they find her?" and said "I panicked -- I did it." Court records filed in 2001 show that a jury found Jones guilty of rape after a prosecutor said he held a box cutter to a woman's throat, duct-taped her mouth and sexually assaulted her. A judge sentenced him to 10 years in prison. He was paroled in 2008 and discharged in 2010, according to a prison spokeswoman. Published: Thu, Feb 23, 2012