An Alabama father on Tuesday confessed to killing his five children and dumping their bodies.
Timothy Ray Jones Jr., 32, was taken into custody after police found the bodies of his five missing children near a highway Tuesday.
The children, aged between 1 and 8, were reported missing in South Carolina about a week ago. The bodies were found outside Camden, Ala. Jones confessed after his arrest that he dumped the corpses in garbage bags near a rural highway, reports the New York Daily News.
Jones was reportedly high on synthetic marijuana when he was detained in Smith County Saturdayafter being stopped at a motor vehicle checkpoint near Raleigh, Miss. He was initially charged with drunken driving, however, following the recovery of bodies, he was charged with child neglect.
"Neighbors told deputies that the children's father said he was moving with his children from his home near Lexington to another state," said Lexington County, S.C., Sheriff Lewis McCarty, CNN reports.
According to the officials, Jones will most likely be prosecuted in South Carolina. "What we believe has occurred is he killed the children in South Carolina and drove to Alabama with them," said Daniel Jones, the district attorney of Smith County, Miss., according to NBC News.
After a background check, the police found that Jones was wanted in South Carolina "regarding a welfare concern of his children," who were on the national missing persons list, the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation said in a statement, the Associated Press reported.
The FBI had issued an alert for the children after their mother reported them missing Sept. 3. The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation said that Jones is currently awaiting extradition to South Carolina.
