A Maryland mother spoke out Monday on the murder of her daughter, Kayla Hamilton, who was killed in July 2022. After months without a suspect in custody, authorities announced the arrest of an unnamed 17-year-old in connection Hamilton’s death.
The 17-year-old was arrested for allegedly strangling Hamilton to death. He was in the country illegally and is a suspected member of the MS-13 gang.
Tammy Nobles remembered her daughter as a "kind-hearted, very loving child." She explained on "Fox & Friends" that Hamilton, a 20-year-old with autism, only saw the good in everyone, which also brought concerns.
"She was very trusting, too trusting. And she could not see danger at all," she told host Brian Kilmeade.
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Nobles told WMAR-TV in Baltimore she was shocked to learn the suspect was a teenager.
"I could not believe a teenager could do this," she said.
The suspect was charged with first-degree murder as well as rape and robbery. Nobles told CBS News she feels responsible because she was unable to keep her daughter safe.
She explained to Kilmeade the difficulty of processing her daughter’s death.
"Not only that we have to process losing her, but we also have to process what happened to her," Nobles said Monday.
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Nobles said she hopes the suspect in custody is given the maximum possible sentence She agreed with Kilmeade that he should not be given the "juvenile treatment."
"I feel that he's done this at such a young age, there's no telling what he's capable of as an adult," she said.
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Nobles said she wouldn’t want any other parent to experience what she has gone through, but she expressed gratitude for the work that went into finding and arresting the suspect.
"I just want the detective and everyone that worked on her case to tell them thank you for working so hard on her case and apprehending the person who did this to her," she said.
Kilmeade said the system failed the family "every step of the way," and that the suspect should never have been in the U.S. in the first place.
"I don't know where he came from. I don't know how he got here or how he ended up being in the same area as her," said Nobles.
Fox News' Emma Colton contributed to this report.
