More than a year after a 13-year-old Lancaster girl was kidnapped and murdered, her brutal death is far from forgotten in the Oak Cliff Neighborhood where her body was found.
“It’s personal for me, even though I didn’t know the little girl, it’s just the fact that it happened and it happened in my neighborhood,” Lucious Thompson, who lives a few houses away said.
13-year-old Shavon Randle was kidnapped in June of 2017 and later found dead in a vacant Oak Cliff home. Six people were eventually arrested with the FBI joining the investigation.
“That was a very heinous crime done by individuals that didn’t think about the impact that it would have not only taking the life of a 13-year-old but what impact that would have on Dallas as a community,” Special Agent Eric Jackson, in charge of the FBI Dallas Division said.
The Randle case was one of Jackson’s first major cases after taking over the Dallas Division and one that he says took an emotional toll. Raised in Dallas, he says the brutality of the Randle murder impacted him from day one.
“That was the day I vowed our efforts to stamp out violent crime in Dallas was going to become a major focus,” Jackson said.
Of six people arrested in connection with the murder one was charged and convicted of federal gun crimes. Five others were charged with kidnapping, robbery and evidence tampering. So far, no one has been charged with murder. The house where Randle’s body was discovered was later torn down by the city of Dallas.
