RAGLAND, Ala., May 12 (UPI) -- Police in Alabama said they have charged a 14-year-old boy with the murder of his 9-year-old half-sister, who was found strangled by a rope hanging from a tree.
St. Clair County Sheriff Terry Surles said Katelynn Arnold was pronounced dead at St. Clair Regional Hospital after her body was found late Thursday outside her home in Ragland, about 40 miles northeast of Birmingham, CNN reported.
The 14-year-old suspect's identity was not disclosed. A hearing will determine whether he will be tried as an adult, Surles said.
Prosecutors said the boy has been charged in juvenile court with one count of murder.
Both the suspect and the victim lived with foster parents, Surles said, but it was not known whether they were related to the foster family.
When the victim's foster mother found Katelynn, her body was "touching the ground; it wasn't as if she was dangling on from a tree limb," Surles said.
The St. Clair county coroner ruled the cause of death was ligature strangulation and determined the case to be homicide, CNN reported.
