Runaway NJ teen said mom stabbed her, threw bleach – NEWS10 ABC

EAST ORANGE, N.J. (PIX11) — A criminal complaint filed by the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office against Jamie Moore, the mother of a 14-year-old runaway who was missing for nearly a month, detailed horrific allegations of abuse in the East Orange household, according to two law enforcement officials familiar with the case.

Referring to the child by her initials, the complaint said Jamie Moore, 40, endangered her minor child’s welfare “specifically by stabbing the victim to her shoulder, causing a laceration that is still visible.” The complaint notes that she also allegedly abused the teen by “spraying bleach in her eyes, pulling her braids out, striking her in the head with a frying pan, striking her with blue hangers, striking her with a broom handle.”

The litany of alleged abuse doesn’t end there. She allegedly hit her daughter with a Febreeze can and blocked her air passages. At one point, “placing Jamie Moore’s knees on her neck and back, causing her to struggle to breathe and striking her repeatedly with hands and knees, in violation of NJSA 2C:24-4A (2).”

PIX11, NEWS10’s sister station in the New York City metropolitan area, reported on the teen for its new series called “The Missing,” which looks at cases that normally don’t get much attention. Almost immediately, the FBI and New Jersey State Police got involved in the efforts to trace the teen’s whereabouts.

PIX11 interviewed Moore on October 27, when her daughter had been missing nearly two weeks. She sobbed that her daughter was a happy child “who wouldn’t want me to worry.”

In the last week, the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office, led by Theodore Stephens, took over as the lead law enforcement agency in the case. On Thursday night, a good Samaritan in Harlem apparently spotted the teen. She’d cut off all her braids and initially denied being who she was.

After questioning from NYPD police officers, she opened up about her unhappy home life. Her mother was taking part in a search party in East Orange at the time and said she “fell to her knees” when learning her daughter was found unharmed.

Moore was arrested, and remains in the Essex County Correctional Facility on two counts of child endangerment, which include charges of physical abuse and neglect. She’s expected to face a judge soon in Criminal Court. The 14-year-old girl and her 3-year-old brother were both removed from Moore’s custody and placed with New Jersey’s Division of Child Protection and Permanency.