Transcription
The whole state of Alabama is on edge right now. We have some breaking news about a missing three-year-old child in Birmingham. Nothing brings a city together like the welfare of a child. We are highly concerned about where little Kamille, affectionately known as Cupcake, is. It's like a needle in a haystack. You see this gorgeous little girl just disappear, and her parents have no answers. My faith was gone. We were living the nightmare here in Birmingham.
Birmingham is a quite beautiful city. It's called the Magic City. It's a small town, but it does have a big-town flavor. And I mean a flavor in the sense of good food as well. Everybody knows each other. So it's only state, like somewhere over here. You got to go. You got to meet somebody that you know.
I first moved to Birmingham back in 2002. The first stop I made when I first moved to Birmingham, my wife and I visited the Civil Rights Institute and basically baptized ourselves in the history of the civil rights here. These are the actual bars that Doctor King was locked behind. You have racial issues back, especially during the '60s and early '70s. It takes time to appreciate the richness of the civil rights history, how much it means to so many people, but also that it hasn't changed as much as you might think over the last 50 to 60 years.
Kamille "Cupcake" McKinney is the picture-perfect example of a girl growing up in the city of Birmingham with her whole life ahead of her. I. Have no. I always had the cupcake when I was pregnant with. I mean, a daughter. You know, there's something sweet. Big brown, nice big smile. A lot of very colorful personality. Very colorful. We're really. She was my cell phone key. Like, if she did something, like, you can be mad at her because, you know, they're so cute. You know.
On October 12th, 2019, Camille's mother was actually going to visit her cousin, who lives in the Tom Brown Village, which is about ten minutes east of downtown Birmingham. Now I proceed to the house, getting there, talking to my cousin. Camille actually was able to play with her cousin around the same age in the yard. About 20, 30 minutes. It started to get dark. I remember my son Amaro coming in to use the bathroom, and I told him I was like, you know, get your sister, we can go. And in the middle of me finishing up my conversation, getting ready to go, my son just is is, you know, forget like he the way he was in the house, confined. He was just like, "Mom, I came back, okay? Okay. Let's go."
We have some breaking news to tell you about a missing three-year-old child in Birmingham. Officers tell me this is a confirmed kidnapping case. You watch the videos on TV. You don't think anything like this happened to you? I cannot remember a significant kidnapping like this in the two decades I've worked here. It was a huge crime scene. Birmingham police. Dozens of vehicles converged on the Tom Brown Village apartment complex to figure out exactly what had happened. Where was she? Was she still in the immediate area? The FBI got involved, and we launched an investigation. There was a witness to this. An 11-year-old boy tells police he saw this dark-colored SUV drive up, a male get out of the SUV, pick up the three-year-old little girl, put her in the SUV, and drove away. What we understand is that this someone lured Cupcake and her cousin over to a vehicle, promising them candy, and then lured Camille into the vehicle, the vehicle that they claimed that she got into. Nobody recognized that vehicle. It was a Sequoia. They also had access to a lot of security cameras, not only in the Tom Brown Village area but in surrounding communities, gas stations, businesses, cars. And so they were gathering as much information as they could. Any information about this? Even the slightest clue. Minutes really do count. Take a look at this beautiful little girl. We hear about custodial kidnappings from time to time. Those are probably once a month. You know, the parents are always the suspect. We had just got out of a long relationship. So because the police were so adamant about it being a custodial battle the first few days and having to take a ladder to this. Initially, everyone's is a is a suspect. And you don't rule out the the parents until you rule them out. Once we heard the senior detectives with the Birmingham Police Department describing the facts as they knew them, we knew this was a different story.
A number of people have been out here searching and praying day and night for three-year-old Kamille "Cupcake" McKinney. When you couple the picture of Cupcake McKinney with that nickname, it was hard not to just tug at your heartstrings to want to help in any way. Birmingham Police Chief Patrick Smith says all available resources have been put on this case. This doesn't just affect Camille's family or the neighborhood she was in, but it affects our entire city. I kind of imagine when her mom also did want to. Dominic McKinney says his three-year-old daughter, Kamille McKinney, also known as Cupcake, means the world to him. It's a hard line to swallow because I ain't no member, Cupcake. She's a good little girl. She's sweet. She's really lovely. But I like Cupcake. If anybody can find anybody a Cupcake, please bring my Cupcake back home. I'll do anything to get Cupcake. Baby.
Birmingham police say they are searching for this vehicle. A dark-colored, older model Toyota Sequoia. There was an hour and one call from someone that believed they had seen someone in a vehicle that matched the description of the Toyota Sequoia that was seen leaving the scene of the apartment complex where she disappeared on October 14th. It was just two days after Kamille was kidnapped. Police did announce that they had taken two persons of interest in custody, and the two persons of interest, Patrick Stallworth and Derrick Brown. Patrick Stallworth and Derrick Brown were dating. They had a romantic relationship. Evidence was obtained that allows our detectives to obtain warrants for both individuals that we have in custody. They did announce some charges against Patrick Stallworth regarding child pornography on a cell phone. That charge had nothing to do with the kidnapping of Kamille McKinney, but that was a basis for them to hold him. The second person we have in custody is Derrick Orisha Brown. We have a probation revocation with no bond for her. The original charge for her happened to be kidnapping. She had taken her three children when she did not have custody of them. The community had a sense of relief, hesitant relief, thinking maybe if they've found somebody that they believe is connected to her kidnapping, that maybe she would turn up any day. It was day three. We don't we don't we don't have any. Time is very precious right now. Let the baby go.
While police expanded the Amber Alert for her to surrounding states. This afternoon, Police Chief Patrick Smith said it's possible she's still in the area. On October 16th, Birmingham Police Department received a tip. Birmingham Police got a tip this morning they found credible where three-year-old Kamille McKinney might be. But this could be it. The search could be over. Birmingham police got a tip this morning. They found credible on where three-year-old Kamille McKinney might be. They believe that Cupcake McKinney could, in fact, be on Jefferson Avenue at a location there, which is about ten, 15 minutes west of downtown Birmingham. I actually was co-anchoring the midday cut-in, and they've been there now for almost three hours. We had live crews on the scene, cameras from several different angles, showing just dozens and dozens of law enforcement officers from various agencies just converging on the scene. My feeling has been that she's here, that she wasn't taken anywhere. I'm relieved by that. There was a competing TV station that received a tip from a law enforcement source that implied that. Yes, that Kamille McKinney had been found. A lot of people seem to feel that we're close to a resolution here, but I'm certainly not going to provide any false hope. I remember scrambling, trying to figure out where did they get this information from? I don't know.
For a time, cautious optimism seemed to fill Jefferson Avenue. This many believed was the time and the place. Maybe they knew something before we could get it confirmed. Maybe they're right. Maybe. Maybe she was found safely. People are waiting to see if the three-year-old would finally be coming home. After three hours, it was revealed those hopes were dashed. It was a false lead. We received information that we thought was credible for this particular location. On the location of Kamille. We have not located the young lady. We want everybody to understand. Please understand. We are still searching for her. How confident are you that you will find her even after an extensive search here this afternoon? We're very confident. We know everybody's concerned about her well-being, and we're going to keep searching. We're not going to give up. And we know this community is not going to give up on her.
About a week after Camille was taken, there was a vigil held at the Saint James AME church. In what I just remember at also just breaking down, crying and by myself at the waffle iron. Those days I have just sick to my stomach. They placed their hands on Camille's mother. They prayed on her that we were. Standing on God's promises, that in the end, everything is going to be alright. And they say you don't post a question that. They I pushed them, I let why this happened to me. What did I do? I'm a good person, you know. I don't do low-down things to people. Why do you let this happen to me? My faith was gone.
One day, after bonding out of jail, an attorney for a person of interest is talking. He's disappointed that someone is. Label him as involved with kidnapping a beautiful child. While his client works in the area where the incident happened and was in the area that day, they may be able to give an alibi where he was at the time of the kidnapping. It became personal to everyone. Everyone kind of put themselves in the place of the parents of this child. Just watching the news and waiting to hear about her. If you live in Birmingham or anywhere near the greater metropolitan area, you've been touched by the recent event, little Camille. It could happen anywhere. And I mean, she is so precious. There's a lot of love that the first time I really just see me about just get the girl love. It didn't matter your race. It didn't matter. Your religion didn't matter. We. We're all just one.
So ten days after Kamille "Cupcake" McKinney was taken from the Tom Brown Village Apartments, the Birmingham Police Department held a press conference to announce an update in the case, led by the actual police chief himself. And at that point, when you saw him walk out there and step in front of the camera, you felt, okay, this is it. They're going to either tell us they found her safely or they found her remains. Ten days after Kamille "Cupcake" McKinney was taken from the Tom Brown Village Apartments, the Birmingham Police Department held a press conference to announce an update in the case. Very big update in the case. But our investigators, along with the FBI, have worked tirelessly 24 hours a day to locate this young child. We were looking through 12, 13 tons of trash. Stan Ruffin was actually a supervisory special agent with the FBI and was there on the scene. It was determined that there were two or three more dumpsters that were in an apartment complex near the persons of interest's apartment. A lead was developed that it was a potential location of Cupcake's body in one of these dumpsters. Cynthia Bowlby, the case agent, went at that dumpster. Searched. A truck that was going to take that dumpster to the landfill and dump it with the rest of the trash. She had to stop the driver and say, "Wait, don't take that dumpster. We need to search it." The sun was going down, and soon we were going to lose the ability to go through this. So I decided at that point to to join into the search physically. Typically, you know, a supervisory agent is not one searching like that. I was in the pile of trash for probably five to 10 minutes, and I saw what I thought was a doll. So I proceeded to go closer to the to to what I saw and discovered that it was, it was the remains of a Cupcake. Definitely a tragic update to tell you about tonight. A body believed to be little Kamille "Cupcake" McKinney. Found tonight. Discovered in a dumpster. When we found that child, not a dry eye. We took a moment. Everybody stopped what they were doing. We had several moments of quiet. We found this evening remains of a child that we believe to be Camille. Say, I was just in denial because this wasn't what I. What I wanted. A year from now, she's supposed to be prepping for pre-K. But like I said, my emotions. I was mentally gone. Like. I feel helpless. It was heartbreaking. It shook the community to the core that we was going to find a life. But I think it was just murder. The hopes of Vega didn't matter. I'm going to come back home safe and just know they discarded her like she was military. This is tough. It's a tough moment for our city. Tomorrow we will be screening warrants for kidnapping and capital murder against Patrick Stallworth and Derrick Alicia Brown. Locating the remains were the last pieces of the puzzle that we needed to bring. The capital murder charges and the kidnap charges against the individuals. Matching that, you. Killed the little girl.
When Patrick Stallworth and Derrick Brown entered the courtroom in chains, you can see the look on their face that they knew they were in big trouble. According to warrants read out loud in court, Kamille McKinney died on or about October 12th, which is the same day she went missing from the Tom Brown Village complex. Warrants also stated she died from asphyxiation. FBI phone tracking records put Stallworth at the scene of the kidnapping on October 12th. FBI analysis found the DNA of Stallworth, Brown, and McKinney on a plastic mattress cover. The toxicology reports showed that they drugged her. It's just unspeakable, the things that she went through prior to her leaving this world.
So after the charges were announced against Patrick Stallworth and Derrick Brown, every time there was either a birthday or an anniversary of her disappearance, there was a major gathering of the community and family. And. Balloon releases, you know, vigils, remembering what she meant to the family and her neighborhood. The story just did not die, didn't perish. So. Patrick Stallworth's trial was first. And that transpired in the fall of 2022. I took the stand during the Stallworth and the Browns. Trial. Stand. Ruffin said. He had investigated a lot of high-profile cases, including 9/11, and no probe that he'd ever been involved with before had affected him so personally. It just brought back a lot of emotions. And shortly after discovering the remains. Any time I would see it through a four-year-old girl, it would remind me of her. Both juries did not take very long to convict both Derrick Brown and Patrick Stallworth of the fatal kidnapping of Camille "Cupcake" McKinney. I can say, by the way, that you're looking at Patrick's naked. Jump on him right there. I think they would've. The minute they were convicted of those two counts of fatal kidnapping of a child. They were never getting out of prison. The only thing that's good about the situation is they're not on the streets to do what somebody else.
For the last 1,237 days, April Thomas has lived a mother's worst nightmare. In your eyes. How evil are these two? They are abomination. Abomination to the scum of the earth. The things they did, I mean, were human. Who would do something like they? They might look like us on the outside. But as aside. And that's when you become an abomination.
In the year since the death of Kamille "Cupcake" McKinney, Birmingham police launched Safe Passage to ensure what happened to McKinney doesn't happen to any other child. We station community members from block to block so that kids are able to walk, freely to and from school. Honestly, I feel like this like one of my biggest mistakes that I beat myself up about today was being comfortable. We I was raised. You know, he's playing for it. Go away. Mommy. Parents. They might sit in the living room would be talking to laughing or, you know, somebody's going to shake. And at some point and, you know, like, I didn't kick in and out the door at one point, I just. Got called a wrong place while they. This could have happened to anyone. The bad people involved are the ones who should be held accountable for this tragic situation. Help your children. And I think now we're going to go ahead and take out full coverage of Kamille "Cupcake" McKinney Funeral Services. That moment that the 11 news I'm wish defeated was behind her. I want to come out not just to show support, but to show love. I ain't never seen that like it. Big picture. The Birmingham community grew closer together over the time of Cupcake McKinney's disappearance and search for her. That's the most lasting impact.