A March discovery in a vacant field led to murder charges, then a wider indictment, in the deaths of two half-sisters from Cleveland.

CLEVELAND, Ohio — A Cleveland mother has been charged in the deaths of her two young daughters after a dog walker found one of their bodies inside a suitcase in a shallow grave on the city’s East Side, setting off an investigation that later identified the girls as 10-year-old Amor Wilson and 8-year-old Mila Chatman.

The case has gripped Cleveland because it moved quickly from an unidentified death scene to charges against the girls’ mother, 28-year-old Aliyah Henderson, while key medical questions still remained open. Prosecutors first announced aggravated murder charges days after the March 2 discovery, then obtained a broader indictment March 20 that added counts including kidnapping, tampering with evidence, child endangering and gross abuse of a corpse. Henderson later pleaded not guilty, and the case now sits in the early court phase.

Police said officers were sent just after 6 p.m. on March 2 to the area of East 162nd Street and Midland Avenue after a man walking his dog reported what looked like a body inside a suitcase. Officers found a second suitcase nearby in the same field, also containing human remains. Cleveland Police Chief Dorothy Todd said the bodies appeared to be those of two girls, roughly between 7 and 11 years old, and said early investigators did not see obvious signs at the scene that explained how the children died. The location, near Ginn Academy in the South Collinwood area, quickly became an active crime scene as detectives and the medical examiner began trying to identify the children and trace how long the suitcases had been there.

For two days, the girls were known publicly only as two children found in buried suitcases. Then authorities said DNA relationship testing showed they were half-siblings, and the medical examiner identified them as Amor Wilson, 10, and Mila Chatman, 8, both of Cleveland. Police arrested Henderson on March 4. Prosecutors said she is the girls’ mother. In the first round of charges, police announced two counts of aggravated murder. At that stage, officials were still waiting on a final cause of death ruling, though prosecutors later said the manner of death had been preliminarily classified as homicide. That left one major question unresolved even as the criminal case accelerated: not whether investigators believed the girls were killed, but exactly how they died.

The deaths drew immediate attention because of both the children’s ages and the way they were found. Family members later spoke publicly about the girls as sisters who should have been protected, while neighbors and mourners left flowers, stuffed animals and candles near the field. The site itself became part of the story: a patch of ground in a residential area where the suitcases were partly buried, close enough to homes and a school to deepen the shock. Cleveland officials called the deaths a tragedy for the entire community. The case also widened into a broader public discussion about what warning signs may have existed before March 2, though the court record available so far has focused more on the alleged crimes than on any full public accounting of the family’s earlier history.

On March 20, a Cuyahoga County grand jury returned a much larger indictment. Prosecutors said Henderson was charged with six counts of aggravated murder, four counts of murder, six counts of kidnapping, three counts of child endangering, one count of tampering with evidence and two counts of gross abuse of a corpse. Prosecutor Michael O’Malley said the case had shocked the community and said his office would continue working with police and the medical examiner. Henderson was arraigned days later in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court, where a not guilty plea was entered on her behalf and her $2 million bond remained in place. The cause of death, according to prosecutors, was still under investigation even after the indictment.

Outside court, the grief remained personal and raw. Fathers of the children spoke publicly and asked that Henderson remain jailed, with one family statement describing the girls as children who loved ordinary things and should still be here. At memorials, mourners left small toys and handwritten notes. The plainest facts of the case have remained the hardest to absorb: two elementary school-age girls, found in luggage, hidden in a field, then named days later after forensic work. The prosecution now moves ahead on the theory that their mother killed them and tried to conceal their bodies, while the defense begins its response in court and investigators continue building the record around the children’s final days.

The case stood on April 1 with Henderson jailed, a not guilty plea entered and the indictment in place. The next milestone is the court schedule that follows arraignment as prosecutors press the homicide case and the medical examiner completes the remaining death findings.

Author note: Last updated April 1, 2026.