Ohio mother charged with aggravated murder after daughters found in suitcases

An Ohio mother was charged with aggravated murder Thursday after the bodies of her two young daughters were found buried in separate suitcases in shallow graves in Cleveland earlier this week, authorities said.

Aliyah Henderson, 28, has been charged with two counts of aggravated murder in the deaths of Mila Chatman and Amor Wilson, police told Fox News Digital.

The Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office confirmed the girls’ names and said DNA relatedness testing helped identify them. Mila is 8 years old and her half-sister Amor is 10, the office said.

The medical examiner’s office did not disclose the cause of death.

The girls were discovered Monday evening, near East 162nd Street and Midland Avenue, when a man walking his dog in an area near Ginn Academy found a partially buried bag and called police.

Officers responded and located a shallow grave containing a deceased person inside a bag. After searching the area, police found a second shallow grave and another bag containing a second body.

Mila’s father, DeShaun Chatman, said in an interview with The Associated Press that investigators told him late Wednesday that his daughter had died.

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8-year-old Mila Chatman was identified by the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office after her body was found buried in a suitcase in Cleveland earlier this week. (DeShaun Chatman via AP)

Chatman said she has had custody of her daughter for five years and has requested emergency custody several times. He said he didn’t see Mila until 2020 when she was 3 years old.

He also said that he tried to locate Mila through a child welfare agency, but was unable to do so because he did not know where she lived.

“This is so terrible,” Chatman told the outlet.

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People visit the memorial at the site where the bodies of two girls were found earlier this week in Cleveland, Thursday, March 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)

He said Mila eventually lived near where the bodies were found, adding that she “felt useless, I couldn’t save my baby.”

“Mila was lucky and always smiling,” Chatman said. “Her favorite color was pink; she swore she was a princess. She was always happy. She was a child.”

Law enforcement officials said they took Henderson into custody Wednesday evening. Another child, who appeared healthy, was found in a home that authorities searched and was placed in the custody of the Department of Children and Family Services, officials said.

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The discovery was a “horrible, horrifying situation,” Cleveland Police Chief Dorothy Todd said at a news conference earlier this week.

“This is a traumatic event for our officers and the community,” he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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