North Carolina man kills 15-year-old daughter by slitting her throat before walking into police station to confess
WESLEY CHAPEL, NORTH CAROLINA: A North Carolina man reportedly turned himself in a day after murdering his 15-year-old daughter, it was revealed in on Monday, August 19.
At around 9.30 am on Sunday, 32-year-old Joshua Burgess of Wesley Chapel, North Carolina walked into the Union County Sheriff's office and told officers he'd killed his teenage daughter Zaria Burgess inside his residence on Hampton Meadows Road, WSOC-TV reports.
After turning himself in, Burgess “provided detailed information concerning his daughter’s death and where her body was located," investigators said.
The tragedy befell Zaria after she came to visit her father over the weekend.
According to the report, there was a collective gasp in the courtroom during Burgess' Monday morning arraignment hearing when officials revealed how he'd confessed to strangling her daughter and then slitting her throat.
However, the prosecutor did not establish a motive or explain what led up to the alleged homicide.
"It's just pure evil," Union County Sheriff spokesman Tony Underwood told reporters.
During the courtroom proceedings, the accused father was seen avoiding eye contact and hanging his head in front of the judge.
However, Burgess' Facebook profile told quite a different story as authorities found it was filled with endearing posts for his daughter, with him wishing her a happy birthday, calling her his "princess", and even changing his profile picture to a photo of Zaria.
Dytaysha Wadsworth, Zaria's cousin, told reporters she was a kind girl who loved her family.
"She was the type of kid to come in a room come or in a house and say, 'Hey everybody,' Just wanting to make everybody smile," Wadsworth told WSOC-TV. "She was so young and nobody deserves to leave this world like that, especially by someone they thought was gonna protect them and be there for them."
At the end of the hearing, a court-appointed attorney was assigned to Burgess after he was read his rights.
He is scheduled to make his next court appearance next month.
That said, further details about the case are yet to be released as an investigation is underway.
Anyone with information about the case is urged to immediately call the Union County Sheriff’s Office at 704-283-3789 or Union County Crime Stoppers at 704-283-5600.