Local

Slain girl's diary leads to suspect

CLAYTON COUNTY, Ga.,None — More than a year after her death, the diary of a 15-year-old Clayton County girl helped police find a murder suspect.

Caffian Hyatt told Channel 2's Amy Napier Viteri her daughter Candice Parchment disappeared April 28, 2010. Investigators found her remains in a wooded area off Sylvia Drive in Forest Park the following November.

Last month, police got a lead when Hyatt said she found a diary belonging to her daughter as she packed for a move. In the diary, Hyatt found the names of two teenage boys.

"Apparently they pulled her into the house and tried to rape her," Hyatt told Napier Viteri.

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She said the teens threatened her daughter, who never reported the incident, but she wrote about it. Hyatt handed the diary over to Clayton County police, who found a teen referenced in it named Marshae Hickman. He was locked up in the Clayton County Jail on a burglary charge. According to the affidavit, Hickman, 19, confessed to strangling Parchment and hiding her body under a mattress. Hyatt said she's not sure yet if his arrest will bring closure.

"It's over a year. It's almost two years. This pain never goes away," she said.

Hyatt still does not know why her daughter left home the night of April 28. In hindsight, she said she would have gone through her daughter's things immediately if she knew a diary existed. She told Napier Viteri she wants to know why Hickman hurt her daughter. She also wants him to know what he has taken from her family.

"I will never get to see her. I will never get to have grandchildren through her, see the woman she would have become," Hyatt said.

Hickman is charged with murder and concealing a death. He is scheduled to appear in court next week.