GRAND RAPIDS -- Jozlynn Martinez, the 2-year-old Grand Rapids girl missing since Tuesday, is dead, police said tonight. The announcement came hours after Jeffrey Lynn Malmberg was arraigned on kidnapping charges tied to Jozzlyn's disappearance from their home at 915 Nagold St. NW.
The girl's mother, Consuela Martinez, 21, told police she last saw the brown-eyed girl late Monday night.
Police Chief Kevin Belk said Malmberg, the mother's live-in boyfriend, told investigators Jozlynn Martinez died at the home at 915 Nagold NW on Monday night.
Authorities have not said how they believe the little girl died.
Malmberg told police Jozlynn's body was taken to a commercial trash Dumpster several blocks away from the home. Trash pickup area in the area was Thursday morning.
Police would not say how her body was transported to the trash bin.
A search at Kent County's waste-to-energy facility on Market Street involved 70 officers and federal agents, as well as a state police cadaver dog. They sifted through more than 200,000 pounds of garbage.
The cadaver dog was not effective in sniffing out evidence because "there's too much there," Capt. Jeff Hertel said of the overwhelming smells.
Grand Rapids Police Chief Kevin Belk announced that Jozlynn Martinez died during a Friday press conference.The plant takes in 150 trucks of garbage a day. Authorities said they were able to identify the pile of garbage from the truck that would have picked up trash from the Dumpster Jozlynn's body reportedly was put in.
Police don't know if her body is still at the facility, or if it has been incinerated. Ninety percent of the garbage taken to the facility is burned.
During his arraignment today in Grand Rapids District Court, Malmberg was ordered held on a $1 million bond as District Judge Jeanine LaVille called him an "extreme danger to public safety."
Consuela Martinez, the girl's mother, said Thursday she believes Malmberg took the toddler to punish her for asking him to leave the home they'd shared for 1 1/2 years.
Martinez said she was concerned about bruises she had seen on Jozlynn.
http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2010/02/man_tells_police_he_threw_body.html