The Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences in Texas revealed the cause of death of Audrii Cunningham,
According to the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences, Audrii died from “homicidal violence” and blunt force trauma to the head. Her body has been transferred to Harris County.
As CrimeOnline previously reported, 42-year-old Don Steven McDougal, who lived in a trailer behind a Livingston home where Cunningham lived with her father, admitted that he agreed to take her to her school bus on February 15.
An AMBER Alert was issued by the Polk County Sheriff’s Office after Audrii didn’t show up for school and didn’t board her bus that morning. On February 20, police found her body in the Trinity River. A criminal complaint obtained by The Docket indicated that she had a large rock tied around her with a rope.
Police found her Hello Kitty backpack downstream from where they located her body. According to People, the institute officials didn’t specify any additional injuries.
McDougal, reportedly a friend of Audrri’s father, has a lengthy criminal history dating back to 2007, which includes assault and enticing a minor. Six months before Cunningham’s death, McDougal allegedly stabbed a stranger, David Stanley, three times.
“Mr. Stanley received a knock on the door from a female. She said that her car was broken down and she needed some help. So Mr. Stanley goes out to her vehicle. As he approaches the vehicle, he’s ambushed and stabbed,” Stanley’s lawyer, David Feldman, told Click2Houston.
When investigators focused their interest on McDougal in the Cunningham case, he allegedly admitted to stabbing Stanley, prompting police to arrest him on assault charges as the search for Audrii continued.
The criminal complaint indicates that police traced McDougal’s whereabouts to “three locations of interest” and that a rope found wrapped around the victim was “consistent with rope that was observed in McDougal’s vehicle on a traffic stop two days prior.”
On Wednesday, McDougal was charged with capital murder and ordered to remain behind bars without bail.
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[Feature Photo: Audrii/Polk County SO; McDougal/Montgomery County Jail
