Transcription
On this episode of Black Girl Gone, I tell the story of Latana Janelle Carwell, a 16-year-old from Augusta, Georgia, whose life was stolen far too soon. The night that she was last seen, she had been at home with her family after spending Easter Sunday together. But in the early morning hours of April 17th, 2017, she disappeared. The investigation that followed twisted and turned in ways no one could have imagined, varying from rumor to revelation as loved ones and an entire community searched for answers. Nearly a year passed before Janelle's body was found. And when the circumstances surrounding her disappearance are revealed, a horrifying truth emerged. This is Latana's story.
It was the middle of the night on April 17th, 2017. 16-year-old Latana Janelle Carwell, known to everyone as Janelle, should have been home asleep, dreaming about her sweet 16 birthday party that she was supposed to celebrate the next day. But instead, just after 1:30 a.m., her mother claimed that she got into a car with her stepfather, Leon Trip, and that was the last time that anyone saw Janelle alive. By morning, she and Leon had not returned. Her mother reported them missing. And for weeks, the community searched, prayed, and held out hope that Janelle would come home. But the truth about what happened that night would take nearly a year to come to light. And when it did, it was darker than anyone could have imagined.
Lata Janelle Carwell was born on April 17th, 2001 in Palestine, Texas, but Augusta, Georgia is where she grew up. Not much public information exists about her life, but we do know that in 2017, she was a sophomore at TWW Josie High School. And according to her teachers, Janelle was the kind of student that every teacher wanted in their class, an honor student, a girl with dreams bigger than the small corner of the world that she lived in. She wanted to be a doctor one day. A family friend, Pastor Angela Harden, once said that Janelle was a loving and very intelligent, smart young woman. And that's exactly how people remember her. Bright, kind, determined. At home, her life appeared simple. She lived with her mom, Tanya Trip, her stepdad, Leon Trip, and her little sister. She was a teenager with her whole future ahead of her.
But here's the thing. Every story has a moment. The one where everything tilts. And for Janelle, that moment began on a day filled with family and celebration. A day that should have been remembered for nothing more than Easter Sunday and the excitement of her sweet 16 just hours away. But looking back, we know that it was the beginning of the end.
On April 16th, 2017, that morning, Janelle, wearing her yellow dress and headband, went to church with her family. It was Easter Sunday, a day of church, family, and food. And when the service ended, the family went home. Later, they gathered again. Tanya, Leon, Janelle, her little sister, and a family friend had a cookout at the trip home. You can almost picture it. The girl going, kids running in and out of the house, music playing somewhere in the background, laughter, food, the kind of Easter Sunday that feels warm and ordinary in the best way. For Janelle, it was the last day that she'd be 15. Her birthday was the next day, and she was looking forward to celebrating the milestone. But when the day ended and everyone went home, the sun went down, the house grew quiet, and but no one knew that they had just lived through the final ordinary day of Janelle's life because by the next evening, everything would be different.
The celebration of Easter was over. The laughter had faded, and the warmth of the day had slipped into the night and then into silence. And as April 17th stretched on, Janelle's 16th birthday, the silence grew louder. There was no birthday candles, no friends coming by to celebrate. No phone calls from Janelle until finally her mother picked up the phone and called 911. At around 8:00 p.m., Tanya Strip's voice came across the line and said, "Yes, ma'am. that was calling to report a missing person. I pray to God that they're not I mean it's not like them not to answer the phone." And then the dispasser asked, "Your husband and your daughter are missing, right?" Tanya said, "And then she explained that her husband Leon Trip had taken Janelle to help a friend with a car the night before and neither of them had come home and neither was answering their phones." "I've been calling and texting," Tanya told the dispatcher. "and they're not answering. Neither one of them," Tanya said. "And that's not like neither one of them because they see me calling, they're going to answer."
That 911 call marked the beginning of the search for Janelle and Leon. And that moment of confusion began to turn into fear. That same day, at around 8:50 p.m., Tanya filed an official missing person's report with the sheriff's office. She told deputies that Janelle and her stepfather Leon had left the house at around 1:30 in the morning. Leon said that he had got a call from a friend named Maurice who was stranded out by Clark's Hill in South Carolina and he decided to go and help. He took Janelle, according to Tanya, because he didn't want to ride alone and he needed help with the GPS. There was Tanya said one more moment after they left. She said that around 2:00 a.m. she spoke to them by phone. She said the call started because her youngest daughter had come to her and said that Janelle is gone and they had both heard the front door slam. Tanya said that she called Leon but before she could finish the question where is Janelle? Leon cut in and said before you say anything I took Janelle because you know I don't know how to work these cell phones. Tanya said that she agreed. And then Leon handed the phone to Janelle. Janelle told her mother that she loved her. And Tanya said that it was the last time she heard her daughter's voice.
When the details landed in the report, deputies had what they needed to open a missing person's case. But the picture framing on the page was already unusual. Two people were gone. Not just a teenager, but the adult who was supposed to be with her. a 1:30 a.m. trip on a school night for car trouble in South Carolina, a friend named Maurice and the explanation that Leyon quote didn't know how to use his GPS and so he brought Janelle. And for investigators, certain things started to stand out right away. The hour, the destination, and the fact that both phones were now quiet and the timing. This wasn't just any Monday. It was Janelle's 16th birthday. If she could pick up the phone for anyone, it would be her mother on that day. And from the outset, this case didn't look like a teenager simply slipping out and staying gone. It looked like a disappearance with a built-in witness. Except the witness was now missing, too. At first, it appeared it was a simple story. A favor for a friend, a quick drive, plans to be back before dawn. But in reality, the first hours of the investigation were marked by silence, crossed wires, and a timeline that felt too thin to hold.
Now, in those first days, the silence felt more like a presence itself. Friends printed flyers, neighbors checked porches, ditches, they looked through culde-sacs. Pastor Angela Harden, she went live on Facebook and Tanya sat beside her, explaining through a tired voice why she hadn't gone that night. On camera, Tanya said that she had serious health issues that had her inside. She claimed that she had brain cancer and lung cancer and had been struggling to catch her breath after the cookout smoke. She said Leon told her to lie down and that he had taken Janelle instead of her because she needed to rest. And then through the early morning hours, she said that she kept calling and texting and nothing. She told viewers that she wanted her daughter back yesterday. The stream became a rally point. Messages, small donations, a reward fund taking shape. Then detectives were still moving, listening for anything that sounded like a lead. And then one finally surfaced, not out in South Carolina, but in Augusta, because on April 20th, Tanya reported her white pickup stolen. It was a 1990 GMC Sierra, and she said that it was either with Leon or Janelle or it had been taken because it was the truck that they had been in when they left. But 6 days later, it reappeared on April 26 on Old McDuffy Road, a mile from their house, parked and empty. Now, technicians went through it piece by piece, but there was no broken glass, no blood, no quick answers tucked in a seat crease. The truck offered a clue without a story. And so investigators turned to the trail that most people don't know they're leaving, their phones. The data drew a map that hugged Augusta. Tower after tower said the same thing, that they had been local. No evidence of a late night run to South Carolina for a stranded friend. And one more detail carried weight. Janelle's digital life, usually very active, went still after that night. Now, a truck back in the neighborhood where they lived, two phones that never reached the destination, and an online world gone quiet. The searches were continuing because there were no answers. Their prayers, however, didn't stop. But the story that began with a favor at 1:30 in the morning was starting to change shape, and the space where answers should have been was getting harder to ignore.
By week's end, investigators knew three hard facts. The truck was back near the house. The phones had stayed anchored to Augusta, and Janelle's online life had gone still. But it was the tips that had begun that tugged them to the west. Now, on April 21st, just days after he was last seen with Janelle, Leon surfaced in Atlanta. Not a rumor, a sighting. and then another. Detectives soon learned that he had roots there, friends who opened doors, couches where he could land for a night or two. Now, according to the sheriff, Leon also made two or three chips between Augusta and Atlanta while the search was still active for him and Janelle. And the tips kept coming and they all said the same thing. Leon was alive, moving unharmed, but none of them included Janelle. No one ever saw her in the city. No one saw her on the road and her name was never attached to any of those sightings, only his.
Now, on May 1st, urgency replaced hope and authorities issued a kidnapping warrant for Leon Trip. The Atlanta sightings had piled up and what had begun as a search shifted suddenly into a chase. May 1st brought the break that no one wanted. In a single line, the case changed shape from missing persons to fugitive. The tone inside the sheriff's office hardened and detectives looped in state partners and the US marshals who pushed fresh bulletins and made the kind of public ask that lands with weight. If you see him, call. Do not approach. The message was clear. Leon was out there, and they needed eyes everywhere. In Augusta, visuals were held. Searches continued, and the reward fund grew one small donation at a time. Flyers that once said missing now said the word kidnapping, taped to gas pumps and corner store windows, and then the cameras followed. Local outlets led their evening broadcasts with updates from the sheriff's office, replaying the same sequence. The truck found, phones had never reached the destination, Leon seen in Atlanta alone, and now a warrant. Reporters also repeated what mattered most, that Janelle was still missing, and every segment ended with a tip line. Through it all, the center of the story refused to move. Not the man on the run, not the chase, Janelle. Because each time the phones rang with another Leon sighting, the silence on the other side of the story deepened. No new photos of Janelle, no pings, no trace to hold in hand. Just a question that grew heavier by the day. Where is she?
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In the early morning hours of April 17th, 2017, Lata Janelle Carwell, known as Janelle, disappeared from Augusta, Georgia, with her stepfather, Leon Trip. 3 weeks later, a kidnapping warrant was issued for him, and Janelle was nowhere to be found. With a warrant for Leyon's arrest and sightings continuing in Atlanta, detectives had widened their search and turned inward, asking a different question. Who were they chasing?
As investigators pulled records, a profile began to come into focus. Leon had a criminal history in Georgia that stretched back to 2001. cases in multiple counties. Charges that included cruelty to children in the third degree, armed robbery, aggravated assault, and battery. It was a past with sharp edges, and it mattered now because it could shape how he moved and why he may have taken Janelle. But according to Tanya, she had first met Leon as teenagers, and then years later, they reconnected while he was incarcerated. letters at first, then phone calls, a slow burn that led to marriage in 2011 while he was still in prison. And then when he was parrolled in 2015, he came home to Augusta into a house with Tanya, her children, and her mother, who was since deceased.
Now, a person from Lyon's past, his exK, also provided information in an exclusive interview with WJBF. And she described the man that she married as a church-going family type who could fix anything with an engine. But she also said that alcohol pulled something darker to the surface. Old anger, old wounds, and when he drank, his abuse got worse. When she left him, he forced his way into her apartment and into her children's room. That she said is what led to the cruelty to children charge. But even so, Kate didn't believe that Leon had killed Janelle or took her out of state. In her view, he's a man who stays close to his center of gravity, which was Oakland City on Atlanta's southwest side. And that had been his world. She said he doesn't roam far. And so if Janelle is anywhere, Kay believed that she was near the places that he knew best.
For detectives, those details did more than sketch character. They drew a map of a man with deep ties in Atlanta, especially around Oakland City, a history that suggested volatility, especially when drinking, and a pattern of staying in familiar territory. Combined with the sightings, it shifted their strategy. Fewer miles, more focus, searched the pockets of the city that he called home.
As Leon's past began to come into focus, and news of the warrant spread, the story started to shift into a new gear and it began to focus on Tanya and what she would say next. On May 2nd, just one day after the kidnapping warrant was issued, Tanya set for an on camera interview. By then, the air around the case was heavy with rumor. People were already asking hard questions about what was really going on, and this interview did not quiet them. Now, when pressed about the new charges against her husband, Tanya didn't align herself with investigators. "In my heart, in my mind, I feel like he didn't kidnap our daughter," she said. Now, when a reporter asked what many in the community had begun to whisper, that Janelle might have been in a relationship with her stepfather, Tanya shut it down immediately. "Really? He married to all this prettiness and he going to run away with our daughter? Come on now. That's stupid." The exchange landed like a stone. To some, it read as a mother defending her husband against an accusation that she found unthinkable, but to others, it widened the gap between the sheriff's version of offense and the families. Cameras continued to roll. The comments piled up, and underneath the noise, it was the constant that mattered most, that did not change, that Janelle was still missing.
Now, the interview didn't calm the waters. If anything, it stirred them, and investigators kept moving. But in the weeks that followed, the community, although suspicious, wrapped their arms around Tanya. They felt for the mother, who claimed that she was battling cancer and who was now dealing with an unimaginable situation. But then, just as the support solidified, the investigation took a turn that no one was ready for.
After weeks of searching, the US Marshalss received information that confirmed that Leon was still in Atlanta, where he had been seen several times, including on a surveillance camera at a local gas station 4 days after Janelle went missing. And so on May 23rd, 2017, Marshall zeroed in on Leon and discovered that he was going to be at a local U-Haul facility for turning a truck. And so officers went to the location, and that's where they found him. After a month of searching, Leon Trip was standing right in front of them. But to their surprise, he wasn't alone. Standing next to him was his wife, Tanya. The same Tanya who had claimed over and over that she had no idea where her husband was. "We were extremely shocked when we found her and him actually together, and that's when we really got that sick feeling that, you know, this case is really not heading in a good direction," the sheriff told True Crime Daily.
Now, Tanya claimed that it was just a pure coincidence that she and Leon had ended up at a U-Haul place together, but police did not believe her, and both Leon and Tanya were arrested. Leon was charged with kidnapping, and Tanya was charged with hindering the apprehension of a suspect. At that point, they weren't sure what she knew and how more she was involved than just hiding Leon. And as the investigation continued, they learned chilling details about just how much Tanya was involved in what happened to Janelle. But word spread fast that Leon and Tanya were arrested. And for a moment, the city held its breath. Whispers flipped into questions. Why together? How long? And where is Janelle? The officials confirmed the arrests and the support around Tanya began to vanish, edged with doubt. There were now two adults in cuffs and a 16-year-old that was still missing.
Once in police custody, according to court records, investigators sat Leon down and read him his rights, and he acknowledged why they were there. Now, when asked if he'd talk, he said he'd tell them what he knew. and then he laid out his version of events. He said that that night he and Janelle left the house to help a friend with a car and then kept going to Atlanta where they stayed at a relative's place. He said it was her 16th birthday and she wanted to shop. And so after 2 or 3 days in the city, he claimed he gave her $400 and Janelle said that she was going to shop and then catch a bus back home. When he returned from work later that day, she was gone and he'd assumed she had already left for Augusta. He said that he didn't see or speak to her again. And according to Leon, he worked in Atlanta the rest of the week. When he finally came back to the house that weekend, Tanya asked where Janelle was, and he said that he told her he had no idea. He said that was the first moment that he realized that Janelle never made it back home and the first time that he understood that police were looking for the both of them. But about an hour into the interview, Leon cut it off. He said he told them what he knew and that he didn't know where his daughter was and he hoped they find her. And then the questioning ended and he was booked into the Richmond County Jail. It was a short story with places, money, and a bus that no one else had seen. And it would not be the last version investigators heard.
But based on what they had already found, they knew that Leon was lying. How in the world was it possible that a week went by without contacting his wife? Everyone in Augusta was looking for his stepdaughter for almost a month. Surely, he would have gotten word back to him. Now, it was nonsensical and the police weren't minding it for a second. Now, when it came to Tanya, it appeared that she had been lying from the beginning. Phone records indicated that she had been in contact with her husband on several occasions in the weeks following her daughter's disappearance. They learned that Tanya had been evicted from the house where she lived in Augusta. And then she had moved to Atlanta where she had begun to live in a house with Leon.
Both Leon and Tanya being arrested was an incredibly heartbreaking twist in this case. I mean, even if Tanya didn't believe her husband was capable of kidnapping her daughter, she spent weeks lying to protect him instead of bringing the truth to light so that Janelle could be found. Leon and Tanya were arraigned and both denied Bond. But while they sat in jail, the investigation had moved from kidnapping to a homicide. And now they needed to find Janelle's body. The home where she lived, where the family had been evicted from, was searched, and evidence was collected. And because Tanya's original story was no longer credible, investigators had to start piecing together what really happened the night of April 16th.
Now, while Leon sat in jail, he was questioned several times. But it was what he said during a June 9th, 2017 interview that confirmed what many already knew. After being questioned repeatedly about his involvement and what happened to Janelle, he said this to investigators, according to court records. "I want to talk to my wife. I want to see my little two kids and my mama. If y'all can do that for me, I'll tell you. You know what I mean? I'm gonna go ahead so y'all can close the case. You know what I'm saying? You know, because I'm tired. But I want to see my two daughters and my mama. I want to see my wife. You hear what I'm saying? And I'll tell y'all, you know what's going on. You know where she is, all that. Because I'm tired. You know what I'm saying?" But without saying much in that moment, he said everything. However, without a body, detectives were stuck. And in order to prove their theory, they needed to find Janelle. She was the final missing piece to this puzzle.
Now, it would be almost a year after her disappearance that they would finally find that missing piece. In March 2018, police in Augusta received a call from someone who said that they were surveying a home in the 2200 block of Golden Camp Road when they found what appeared to be what they believed to be human remains buried in a shallow grave. Now, the home was just a short distance from where Janelle lived. And when investigators arrived on the scene, they confirmed that the remains were human and badly decomposed. The remains were transferred to the coroner who was able to quickly make an identification. It was Janelle. She had been found and she had been there the entire time. It was a devastating ending to a story that had taken turns no one saw coming.
But with Janelle found, investigators had what they needed to upgrade the charges against both Leon and Tanya to murder. A grand jury returned those charges and it recast the entire timeline. Prosecutors say that Leon killed Janelle sometime between April 16th and May 23rd, 2017. They say that Tanya is responsible for murder within that same window and that she misled authorities about how her daughter was taken. And there was more. Leon had faced cruelty to children count in another jurisdiction is also charged here with cruelty to children. Accused of binding Janelle's limbs and inflicting severe physical and mental pain that resulted in her death. The allegations there in black and white and at the center a 16-year-old girl who should still be here.
But the charges on paper did feel like movement. However, it doesn't put the case in front of a jury. Years passed. Court dates were set then slid. Hearings came and went. Motions to suppress arguments over what a jury could hear. rulings that sent pieces of the case up to higher courts and then back again. New indictments, reset clocks, lawyers changed, dockets swelled, a pandemic backlog turned months into years. And so the strangest part of this story isn't only what happened the night Janelle disappeared. It's what didn't happen after. No opening statements, no witnesses sworn, no verdict read in a quiet courtroom. Time kept moving. Prayer lists kept her name. Students that she went to school with graduated. Teachers still remembered the empty desk that she left. And inside the case, the filings, continuences, orders. 7 years after Janelle vanished, the distance between an indictment and a trial feels like a wound of its own. an absence measured not just in days without her, but in justice that never reached a jury.
As far as we know, Lyanna and Tanya remain behind bars. But as of the recording of this episode, there's been no new information about when or if this case will go to trial. We also don't know why this happened. No official motive has been released, no theory presented, no clear answer from the people at the center of this case. There's a timeline that ends in a grave. And that silence sits heavy because motive is the part that helps people breathe through the unthinkable. It offers a reason. Even when the reason is terrible here, there's nothing on the record. No statement that says this is what led to it. This is where it turned. This is why. And so the questions stay. What changed that night? What was said or done that can't be undone? And why Janelle? Until a trial begins or someone speaks, there's only the evidence we do know and the space where an answer should be.
But before anything else, remember Janelle, 16, an honor student who talked about becoming a doctor. A girl whose last ordinary day was church, a cookout, and then a house settling into night. The pain of this story is not only that she's gone. It's who stood in the space where safety should have been. A mother and a stepfather. Now the names on charging papers. The people who were supposed to keep her safe are the ones accused of doing the opposite. And that changes the shape of grief. But 7 years later, there are very few answers, just time. We are only left with what we know and what we cannot make sense of. And so we hold what is hers. Her name, her promise, her place in this world. This is Latana Janelle Carwell story. Not Leon's, not Tanya's, hers. And until the truth is said down, we keep her at the center. We say her name and we sit with the weight of what was taken and we wait for answers that are long overdue. May Lata Janelle Carwell rest in peace. Thank you for listening to this week's episode. Don't forget to follow us on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Tik Tok, and Threads.