Nefertiti_Jaquez's Blog

From the moment the story broke -- my heart sank.

Now, after having covered it from the start (to the story's sad ending), and meeting the family -- it's been even tougher to digest. On a story like this, it's hard for me to put up a wall and block out my emotions. After a story like this, it's hard for me to sleep at night...

Ebony Dorsey was a well-liked honor student, a frequent caregiver, a dancer on her school's dance team, and an aspiring model who had BIG DREAMS, says her dad, Evan Dorsey.   Dreams that were taken away from the teen by a man, who police say, was WIRED on crack cocaine when he allegedly beat, raped, and killed the 14-year-old.

I never got the chance to meet Ebony, but her face and pictures haunt my thoughts. Why? Cause' Ebony Dorsey is an example of a life lost too early.

--- Read more and the latest on the story--- as of: 12.12.07---
A Plymouth Meeting man is now charged with homicide in the case of missing ninth-grade honors student Ebony Dorsey.

Montgomery County First Assistant District Attorney Risa said  that 48-year-old Mark O'Donnell confessed overnight to Whitpain Police.

Ferman said autopsy results showed Ebony Dorsey was beaten and strangled, and her pajamas were found wrapped around her neck.

Police gave the following account in court papers, according to the Associated Press.

O'Donnell drove Dorsey to his apartment after 10 p.m. Thursday  and had her stay with his 4-year-old daughter so that he could spend the night with Dorsey's mother in Ambler.
Dorsey's mother, Danielle Cattie, returned home from work around midnight and told investigators that O'Donnell spent the next five hours smoking a significant amount crack.

O'Donnell left Cattie's house early Friday morning -- she described him as being "wired" -- and returned to his apartment at about 5:30 a.m.

When he came home, he said he found Dorsey changing his daughter's pull-up-style diapers and became angry. He said he started hitting Dorsey and eventually realized her pants were wrapped around her neck. He recalled the 4-year-old calling out, "Daddy," and he realized the teenager was dead.

O'Donnell then moved Dorsey's lifeless body to a relative's house in a plastic container and went to the airport to pick up his wife a few hours later. O'Donnell returned to the relative's home Saturday to cover the container in leaves and sticks.

He was caught Sunday night hiding under a comforter at a different relative's house.

O'Donnell is expected to be arraigned later on Monday.

Crews searched much of Saturday and Sunday for Dorsey until police received information leading them to a wooded area behind a house.

On Sunday afternoon, police covered a blue storage tub with a sheet and closed off the area around the house which belongs to a relative of O' Donnell.
 
 "What I knew of him I did not like," says Evan Dorsey. He says he warned his daughter of O'Donnell and had his suspicions even before police found the body. "'Trust your father. If I tell you someone's no good, it's because I know. Not everybody who claims to be your friend or be trustworthy is such."