Police in Maryland located the body of a beloved 59-year-old teacher after she was reported missing earlier this summer.
Mariame Toure Sylla, a second-grade teacher at Dora Kennedy French Immersion School, mysteriously disappeared on July 29 after going for a stroll at a park near her home located in Greenbelt, NBC Washington reported. Search efforts to find her were unsuccessful.
“Mariame is missing. We are all concerned,” her sister Fati Toure said early last month. “I would like my Mariame to come back. We love her; we need her.”
Days later, on Aug. 1, police received a tip from a person who spotted decapitated remains near a pond in Clinton, about 20 miles away from the park. Last week, officials confirmed that the remains were those of Toure Sylla. Her cause of death has yet to be determined.
“An autopsy is being conducted to determine her cause of death,” Prince George’s County Police said in a Sept. 1 press release. “Investigators are also working to determine where and when she was murdered.”
Authorities charged 33-year-old Harold Francis Landon III of University Park with murder, according to NBC Washington; he reportedly was at the park the same day as Toure Sylla. Landon was arrested the same day Toure Sylla’s body was recovered but for a separate charge related to another case.
“We haven’t found any connection that these two people knew each other, and I don’t believe they knew each other,” Prince George’s County Police Chief Malik Aziz said on Friday, Sept. 1, the outlet reported. “I just think we have a person who decided to commit an horrific crime. The most horrific crime you can do is murder. And do that for some unknown, unjustifiable reason.”
Toure Sylla was touted as an educator who was adored by her students and colleagues.
“She was a loving, caring and passionate teacher,” principal James A. Spence told The Washington Post. “She was a student favorite.”
