‘Horrific crime’: SC woman charged with murder of 11-year-old. She was her caregiver
A suspect in the homicide of an 11-year-old girl in Carolina Forest was charged with murder on Wednesday.
Horry County Police Chief Kris Leonhardt announced Wednesday afternoon that Camihsa McGaskey, 31, of Myrtle Beach, had been charged with allegedly killing A’Kyri Bell, who was visiting from Texas.
McGaskey was originally charged with obstruction of justice alongside Lakesha Burnett, 34; and Alantis Thomas, 21. The trio allegedly “prevented, impeded, or interfered a law enforcement investigation by providing known false statements and attempting to obscure and destroy evidence related to the death of a juvenile victim,” according to Horry County police arrest warrants for the women.
The evidence in question included mops, towels and bedding, which officers discovered in trash bags within the home, which police reports say tested “presumptively positive for blood.”
The three women were booked into J. Reuben Long Detention Center on Thursday morning and subsequently released into home detention with $5,000 bonds. Burnett and Thomas remain charged with obstruction of justice.
Leonhardt said that the “horrific crime” is still being investigated, and that McGaskey’s charge was updated to murder at this time because “basically the evidence pointed that way so far.”
The updated arrest warrant for McGaskey says that she was a caregiver to Bell, and inflicted multiple blunt force injuries to the girl’s head and body which resulted in the girl’s death.
The case was deemed a homicide when Bell’s autopsy revealed that complications from blunt force trauma injuries were the cause of the child’s death. Bell’s body is still in custody at the coroner’s office, according to Leonhardt.
Police responded to a call last Wednesday that brought them to Sago Palm Drive, near Legends Drive and Highway 501 in Carolina Forest in the Myrtle Beach area, where they were needed to help EMS with an unresponsive patient, The Sun News previously reported. Leonhardt said on Wednesday that the call came from inside the house where the incident took place.
There were seven other children in the home at the time, according to Leonhardt, all of whom were removed from the home and taken into custody.
Leonhardt said that the investigation is still underway, and said that the case has been “traumatic” for all those involved, as cases involving child victims always are.
“Some cases in law enforcement, you carry with you your entire career, even after you’ve retired, and these cases are definitely one of those,” he told the press at a conference on Wednesday.
Leonhardt urged the public to “speak for someone who can’t speak for themselves” if they see signs of abuse.
“Give these children a voice,” he said.
This story was originally published June 18, 2025 at 1:36 PM.
