Nola Dinkins: Mother of missing 3-year-old charged with murder

Nola Dinkins Search: Mother of missing 3-year-old girl in Delaware charged with murder

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NEWARK, DE — The mother of 3-year-old Nola Dinkins, the missing girl who was at the center of an Amber Alert in Delaware, is facing murder charges, officials announced during a news conference on Wednesday night.

Darrian Randle, 31, is being charged with first- and second-degree murder, first-degree child abuse resulting in the death of a minor under thirteen, and other related criminal charges in Maryland, according to state police.

Randle was also charged with filing a false police report in Delaware, which sparked an Amber Alert in the area. Randle told authorites that Nola was taken by a white male in his 40s who was bald with peach fuzz, according to police.

Cedrick Britten, 44, of North East, Maryland, was charged with accessory to first- and second-degree murder after the fact, failure to report child death, and other offenses.

Britten, who police say is Randle’s boyfriend, is in police custody in Maryland.

The charges come after a body was found Wednesday around 1:45 p.m. in a vacant lot in Cecil County.

It’s not yet known if the body is that of Dinkins, but officials confirm that the remains are “consistent with that of a child.” Positive identification is pending autopsy results by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Baltimore.

“Our homicide unit investigators had enough information gleaned through the investigation that connected these two individuals with the disappearance of this 3-year-old,” said Elena Russo, a spokesperson for the Maryland State Police.