OTTAWA, Kan. — Eighteen-month-old Lana-Leigh Bailey was one of four victims of a homicide on a farm just outside of Ottawa, Kan. The discovery of the little girl’s remains ends a week-long investigation for law enforcement authorities.
If you go into the neighboring towns, you’ll find flyers posted in restaurants or gas stations for the little girl who was missing.
Many were hoping for a different outcome, but law enforcement officials said they are confident the body they found Saturday night was Lana’s.
Down a dirt road and located on the Franklin and Osage County line is where neighbors believe the little girl’s body was found.
“It’s hard to believe and this close to home. It really hasn’t set in. It’s a really bad thing that happened and we really don’t like thinking about it,” said Josh Magrath, a neighbor told FOX 4 News. “We have kids and if something like that happened to our kids, it would not be a good thing.”
Magrath says agencies from all over the area, including the Johnson County Crime Lab, secured an area near a creek.
“Last night around 7:30, a lot of police vehicles were coming up and down the road. They had the intersection blocked off where they were looking for something down the road here a little bit,” he said.
Franklin County Sheriff Jeff Richards said an Osage County deputy had a hunch and followed it to a rural area in that county.
“We didn’t have any tips or anything that led us there. This was the initiative of a deputy and it was good police work,” Sheriff Richards told reporters.
Richards said at the scene, the deputy found items connected to the homicides and after calling in for more backup, Richards said he believes they found what they were looking for.
“About 10:00 p.m. last night, we discovered and recovered a body that we believe to be that of Lana Lee Bailey,” the sheriff said at a press conference early Sunday morning.
Richards said Lana was killed at a farm off of Georgia Road just outside of Ottawa where the bodies of her mother Kaylie Bailey, her mother’s friend Andrew Stout and Steven White were found.
Kyle Flack, 27. has been charged with their murders.
The farm were Flack allegedly killed the four is located just a few minutes from neighors like Magrath, who still have a lot of questions.
“We’re 15 minutes, 20 minutes from where it actually happened. A good 15 miles. So I mean, why he came over here if that’s what happened? I don’t know,” Magrath said.
Sheriff Richards said while they are confident the body that was found in Lana’s, they are waiting for a positive identification.
He said the search for Lana is now over, but the criminal investigation continues.
Flack is facing several charges. He appeared in court Friday to hear them all.
He has been charged with multiple counts, including capital murder, first degree murder, rape and criminal possession of a firearm.
Investigators say Flack raped Kaylie Bailey before he killed her.
They’re still not commenting on a motive for the crimes, saying the information could jeopardize the investigation.
Sheriff Richards said he’s also planning to meet with the Kansas Bureau of Investigation to talk about some of the problems with the case. He hopes the same problems can be avoided in the future.
Richards said the evidence showed that an Amber Alert wouldn’t have made a difference in this situation.
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