An Illinois woman is charged with killing her 10-year-old son after his remains were found in a garbage can seven months after he died under circumstances not then known by police.
According to Rock Island Police, Sushi Staples, 37, was suspected to have killed her son Zion after someone tipped police about his death, reads a report in Quad-City Times. When police investigated, they found her son stuffed in a trash can inside her garage.
The person who informed authorities told KWQC that she called the Department of Children and Family Services several times over the past few months after the suspect made peculiar comments about her son.
According to the report, Staples told the person that “Christmases would never be the same.”
Police then conducted a wellness check after the person called DCFS in late July.
The son was believed to have died in December and was pronounced dead in July, Coroner Brian Gustafson told the Quad-City Times.
An autopsy report found that the death was not natural and was suspicious in nature, the report further revealed.
“Due to the extreme initiation of the investigation, no further information will be available at this time,” Gustafson said, according to KWQC.
Staples has since been charged with several felonies, including failure to report the death of a child under 13, concealment of death and obstruction of justice, authorities confirmed. Each charge means the suspect faces one to three years in prison for each count.
Furthermore, Staples has been accused of lying to an officer about where her son was and said she did not have a son. She added that his birth certificate was fraudulent, according to a criminal complaint.
The mother “knowingly moved the body of [Zion] from its place of death with the intent of concealing information, regarding the place or manner of [Zion’s] death by moving [Zion’s] body from inside the residence to a large garbage bin that was located in the garage,” the complaint states, the Quad-City Times reported.
Two of the suspect’s neighbors, Andre and Danielle Builta, said they would have never suspected that something had happened at the suspect’s home, adding that it appeared the suspect was living in a happy home.
“We saw that…we saw two girls. You know, coming sometimes, like out in the yard. I saw them drawing with chalk in the back driveway,” Danielle told KWQC. “And with scooters out front of the garage, everything seemed really normal. They would wave when they saw us. And so we were like, ‘Oh, they seem pretty friendly.”
Andrew added that “knowing what was in the garage” about 30 feet from their new house, it’s “worrying” and “kind of scary,” adding that “it was quite a surprise. I wasn’t expecting that at all.”
