Team 4: Why So Long To Find Woman's Body After Baby Taken?

Wilkinsburg Woman Accused Of Killing Pregnant Teen

POSTED: 5:05 pm EDT July 21, 2008

UPDATED: 6:39 pm EDT July 21, 2008

WILKINSBURG, Pa. -- Days after a pregnant woman was found dead in a Wilkinsburg apartment with her baby taken from her, it's still unclear why police took so long to find young Kia Johnson's body.

Police said the 18-year-old McKeesport woman was lying dead on the floor of Andrea Curry-Demus' Wilkinsburg apartment for two days. The 38-year-old Curry-Demus is being held on a homicide charge, and Johnson's newborn boy is being treated in a hospital.

"I can't say anything," Wilkinsburg police Detective Rich Grande told Team 4 investigator Jim Parsons on Monday. "You have to go through the chief of police, partner."

Team 4 said the chain of events appears to be as follows:

10:45 p.m. Wednesday: Curry-Demus arrives at West Penn Hospital in Pittsburgh with a baby whom she claims to have delivered. The umbilical cord is still attached.

Early Thursday: Tests show the woman did not give birth and Pittsburgh police begin to investigate. Because she lives in Wilkinsburg, the case is handed over to the borough's police department.

Later Thursday: Wilkinsburg detectives go to what they think is Curry-Demus' apartment on Ella Street. Nothing is amiss. They leave.

Friday morning: Reporters from WTAE Channel 4 Action News and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review tell Wilkinsburg police about flies and a foul smell at another apartment in the same building.

Early Friday evening: Wilkinsburg detectives confirm the discovery of Johnson's body in that other apartment -- which is where Curry-Demus really lives. They claim her sister, Brooke Curry, led them to the wrong apartment the day before.

No charges have been filed against Brooke Curry. Wilkinsburg police have not said why they took her word about where Curry-Demus lives and why they didn't use Reverse 911 to find the correct apartment on their own.

Wilkinsburg Police Chief Ophelia "Cookie" Coleman started a vacation Monday and declined to speak with Team 4 at her home.

"Excuse me, that is disrespectful," she said. "I am on vacation, all right?"

Later Monday, Coleman told Team 4 by telephone that "we feel ... (the case) was handled in a timely fashion."

Wilkinsburg Mayor John Thompson declined to be interviewed by Team 4 on Monday.

According to the criminal complaint, Johnson was bound with duct tape and plastic was placed over her head. Her body was wrapped in a comforter and a garbage bag and shoved into a space beneath the headboard in Curry-Demus' master bedroom.

Allegheny County Medical Examiner Dr. Karl Williams said Johnson's stomach was cut open, but his office has not determined whether she died before or after the baby was taken from her.

"If she were alive and conscious, the pain would have been fantastic, as well as, of course, the realization that someone was doing this to her and taking her baby, so you would have been talking about three, four people holding her down," said Dr. Cyril Wecht, the county's former medical examiner.

Johnson's father, Eric, told the Trib that his daughter worshiped at the Salvation Army church, worked at a McDonald's restaurant, volunteered to feed homeless people at a hospital and planned to join the Air Force.

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