23-Year-Old US Soldier Charged with Murder And Kidnapping Of Fellow Soldier Hayden Harris latintimes.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from latintimes.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Army specialist and teenager charged with kidnapping, killing 20-year-old soldier
Updated Dec 29, 2020;
Posted Dec 29, 2020
Hayden Harris, 20, was found shot to death in a wooded area in Sussex County.(U.S. Army photo)
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Two people, including a fellow soldier, have been charged with killing a U.S. Army soldier whose body was discovered in Sussex County, N.J., this month, authorities said.
Specialist Jamaal Mellish, 23, of Brooklyn, N.Y., and a 16-year-old male whose name was not released were charged with kidnapping and killing 20-year-old Cpl. Hayden Harris, the Sussex County prosecutor’s office announced Monday.
Harris, who was assigned to Fort Drum in upstate New York, was found shot to death on Dec. 19 in a wooded area near Ross Road in Byram Township, Sussex County First Assistant Prosecutor Gregory Mueller said earlier this month.
With his red hair, freckles and sunny disposition, everyone at home knew Hayden Harris as Opie.
The kid from rural Tennessee was affectionate, thoughtful – a good Christian boy, said Claire Hallissy, a family friend. He had an infectious smile and one passion in life: to join the U.S. Army.
For the 20-year-old, that dream came to a mysterious end last weekend in the snowy woods of Sussex County, 1,000 miles from his hometown in Guys, Tennessee, and 300 more from Fort Drum, New York, where he d been stationed since July 2019. A week after Harris body was found, officials still haven t explained a motive for the alleged killing or why the soldier ended up buried near a secluded cul-de-sac in Byram Township.
FORT DRUM â An argument between two Fort Drum soldiers swapping their vehicles with each other apparently led to one of them being shot to death in a wooded area in northern New Jersey.
First Assistant Prosecutor Gregory Mueller told the New Jersey Herald that the body of Cpl. Hayden A. Harris, 20, was found on Saturday in a wooded area in Byram Township, Sussex County, N.J., and a fellow soldier was taken into custody in connection with his death.Â
Pvt. Jamaal Mellish, 23, remains in the custody of Fort Drum Military Police.
Cpl. Harris was meeting with Mellish âfor some type of vehicle exchangeâ in Watertown when the meeting escalated, according to the New Jersey newspaper.