An Iowa man was handed down a verdict on Wednesday, sentencing him to two life terms for the murder of a 10-year-old girl who had been missing for eight months before her remains were discovered in a pond.

Henry Earl Dinkins will also be required to pay $150,000 in restitution to the mother of Breasia Terrell, according to a report by The Quad City Times.

The young girl disappeared in July 2020, triggering extensive search efforts involving numerous volunteers and law enforcement agencies.

Her body was eventually found in March 2021 by fishermen in a rural area north of Davenport, ABC News reported.

In the previous month, Judge Henry Latham had found Dinkins, aged 51, guilty of first-degree murder and kidnapping. The life sentences imposed come without the possibility of parole.

Prosecutors filed charges against Dinkins for Terrell’s death in May 2021, asserting that he had abducted and fatally shot her.

At the time, she had been staying overnight with her half-brother and his father, Henry Dinkins.

Dinkins is a registered sex offender who was convicted of third-degree sexual abuse in 1990, when he was 17 years old.

Written by staff