Oklahoma police arrested one of the caretakers of four-year-old Athena Brownfield, who was reported missing in Oklahoma last week, and charged him with her murder.

Ivon Adams, 35, was charged with first-degree murder and child neglect for beating Athena to death and burying her body near their old home.

Police first discovered that the four-year-old was missing on Tuesday, January 10, after a postman saw her five-year-old sister wandering outside her home in Cyril, Oklahoma alone.

The postal worker called 911, and when the police could not locate the five-year-old’s sister, Athena, they arrested Adams and his wife, Alysia Adams, 35, and charged them with child neglect.

On Tuesday, January 17, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigations announced that they had recovered a child’s remains and had taken her to a medical examiner’s office for identification.

Alysia Adams confessed to investigators during an interview on Thursday, January 12, that her husband, Ivon, had killed Athena a couple of weeks before she was reported missing. She told officers that on the night of December 25, 2022, at around midnight, her husband mercilessly beat Athena to death at their home in Cyril.  

Adams then took the child’s body and left home. He later told his wife that he buried her at their old residence in Rush Springs, Oklahoma and placed a large broken branch over the burial site.

After burying the child, Ivon Adams fled to Arizona. He was arrested on Thursday, January 12, after his wife’s chilling confession.

Ivon Adams faces one count each of first-degree murder and child neglect.

Alysia Adams is charged with two counts of child neglect for failing to care for the children and failing to protect Athena from abuse.

According to court documents, the girl’s biological mother left the two girls in the care of the Adams family about two years ago, but the couple never took the children to the pediatrician for checkups and didn’t even enroll the girls in school.