DeKalb County police have arrested the mother of a 7-year-old girl whose body was found decaying in the closet of an abandoned apartment Sunday evening, months after its last tenant moved out.
Alondra Hobbs, 27, was taken into custody Thursday on charges of felony murder and second-degree cruelty to children in the death of her daughter, Alivia Hobbs-Jordan. In announcing the arrest, police did not disclose how the child died or what may have preceded her death.
They have not accused her mother of malice murder, which would imply deliberate intention to take the girl’s life. A search of court records showed it was not Hobbs’ first alleged offense.
According to a police report, around 9 p.m. Sunday, someone called investigators to the Hidden Valley Apartments south of Decatur to report seeing a child’s body in the closet of unit 27, then promptly disconnected the cellphone number. The apartment had been vacant for many months, the next-door neighbor told police, but other neighbors said there had been a history of squatters.
Inside a closet, an officer made the grisly discovery. Only visible was a full head of hair, an arm and a leg of what appeared to be a much younger child, the officer said in the report. While her age had not been confirmed at that point, the officer guessed she must have been between 2 and 4 years old.
Also found inside the apartment was a single piece of mail addressed to Alondra Hobbs. A police spokesperson could not confirm Friday if she was the last known tenant.
The apartment complex, formerly known as Spring Valley, is located on Misty Waters Drive in the Candler-McAfee area of DeKalb, bordered by I-285 to the east and I-20 to the south. It is among 272 of the metro area’s persistently dangerous complexes, according to an investigation by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that looked into serious crimes, lax maintenance and other hazards in Atlanta neighborhoods.
At the four listed addresses within the complex, police reported 56 crimes from 2017-2021. At least three people were killed there since 2017, culminating in a deadly shooting in April 2022.
Other crimes included aggravated assaults and robberies, and one arson. DeKalb listed 12 code complaints, the AJC’s investigation found.
Hobbs’ history of arrests in DeKalb dates to 2019, when she was charged with misdemeanor simple assault in a family violence case. She later pleaded no contest to an associated charge of disorderly conduct and was sentenced to 12 months probation. As a condition of her sentence, she was also ordered to attend anger management and parenting classes.
That arrest was followed by another in 2020 on a charge of battery related to family violence, records show. The disposition of that case is unclear.
Further testing is required to determine the cause of the girl’s death, according to Pat Bailey, the director of the DeKalb County Medical Examiner’s Office. An autopsy report will not be made public until the close of the criminal investigation, Bailey said Friday.
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