JASPER COUNTY, Mo. – The Jasper County Sheriff’s Office has released an update to a story from Saturday, April 15.
According to the Jasper County Sheriff’s Office, an AMBER Alert was sent out after a 7-year-old girl had been reported as missing by her mother after she left in a car with a man known as “Matt.”
The girl’s mother told law enforcement that her daughter was supposed to only be gone with the man for a short time but, after she had been gone for over three hours, she contacted authorities.
A driver headed from Oklahoma to Missouri on I-44 saw the car driving towards Oklahoma on I-44 and alerted authorities.
The Joplin Police Department was able to stop the car with the suspect and 7-year-old inside four miles from the Missouri-Oklahoma border near Joplin.
The suspect was identified as 23-year-old Matthew W. Honeycutt of Neosho. Honeycutt was arrested and charged with Kidnapping. He is being held in custody at the Jasper County Detention Center in Carthage, Missouri, on a bond of $250,000.
After further investigation, the mother of the 7-year-old girl, 38-year-old Amber Turner of Sarcoxie, was charged with 1st-degree endangering the welfare of a child creating substantial risk.
Turner was taken into custody and is being held at the Jasper County Detention Center in Carthage, Mo with a bond of $10,000.
