Oaklee Mae Snow (IMPD)
Law enforcement authorities in the Midwest are desperately searching for answers in the disappearance of a 2-year-old Oklahoma girl after her mother was recently arrested thousands of miles away with no sign of the child.
Oaklee Mae Snow, described as being about 2 feet tall and weighing 35 pounds with blonde hair and blue eyes, was first reported missing on Jan. 19 and was believed to be traveling to Indianapolis with her mother, Madison Marshall, the Indianapolis Police Department said earlier this month.
According to a report from the Indianapolis Star, investigators say that when Marshall left for Indianapolis, she was also accompanied by her 7-month-old son, Coleton Snow, and her 25-year-old boyfriend, Roan Waters.
Oaklee and Coleton’s father, Zachary Snow, reportedly told investigators with the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office that Marshall and Waters took the children from his home in Oklahoma on Jan. 19 without permission before fleeing to Indiana where they could stay with Waters’ mother.
The group reportedly arrived in Indianapolis sometime in late January or early February and began staying at a home owned by Waters’ mother, located just south of downtown Indianapolis. While they were staying at the residence, Waters’ sister told investigators that she visited her brother and Marshall at the home and got into a verbal argument with the couple after she saw numerous bruises on Oaklee Snow’s legs, the Star reported. The couple reportedly told the sister to leave the home after the argument.
On Feb. 9, Marshall and Waters left Coleton Snow alone in the home, telling Waters’ sister that they had to take Oaklee to the emergency room after she hit her head while bouncing on a ball, the Star reported. But when the sister saw the couple return to the home, she reportedly told police that she did not see Oaklee with them and later called Child Protective Services.
According to the Star, witnesses in the area that night told investigators that they saw Marshall and Waters leave the residence holding “what looked like a child wrapped in a blanket,” but that the baby “did not appear to be moving, talking or crying.”
“They described it as she was either asleep or unconscious. She wasn’t moving,” Seminole County investigator J.T. Palmer said in an interview with Oklahoma City NBC affiliate KFOR. Palmer said the residence the couple were seen leaving was described as a “crack house.”
Additionally, family and friends reportedly told investigators that they contacted every hospital in the area and were unable to find any record of Oaklee being checked in.
The couple eventually made their way to Colorado and officers with the Greenwood Village Police Department on March 3 arrested Waters at a hotel on an outstanding bench warrant from Oklahoma issued in November. The warrant stemmed from charges of child abuse and domestic assault and battery in the presence of a minor, court records show.
Investigators said Marshall appeared to be staying at the hotel with Waters but wasn’t there at the time of the arrest, nor were there any signs that the couple were traveling with children, per the Star.
Waters reportedly told police that he, Marshall, and the two kids left his mother’s home outside of Indianapolis, went to another house where he and Marshall did drugs, then abandoned Coleton Snow in Indianapolis. The infant was later picked up by Waters’ sister and turned over to CPS who returned him to his father, The Oklahoman reported.
Waters was “unable or unwilling” to disclose to investigators where Oaklee was, but police say he told his mother that he helped Marshall in “dropping her off somewhere” without getting into any specifics.
Marshall on March 23 was arrested in Harnett County, North Carolina, as a fugitive from justice on charges of neglecting a dependent, jail records show. She is currently being held on $800,000 bond as she awaits extradition.
Madison Marshall (Harnett County Sheriff’s Office)
Despite multiple interviews with investigators, authorities have still been unable to locate Oaklee, the Oklahoman reported.
Authorities urged anyone with any information on the case to contact the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department’s Missing Persons Unit at 317-327-6160 or call Crime Stoppers of Central Indiana at 317-262-8477.