The man accused of abusing and murdering an 8-year-old Hayward girl was in court in Merced for the first time Monday.
After a 6-month-long manhunt, Dhante Jackson was charged with child abuse and the murder of Sophia Mason.
Her mother, Samantha Johnson, was arrested in march and is also charged in this case.
Sophia’s aunt was worried Jackson would never be caught.
“I was just relieved and thanking God,” said Emerald Johnson. “It really helped me to have confidence in the team that worked so hard to catch him.”
Sophia lived with her grandma for much of her life until her mom came back in the picture in 2021.
In march of 2022, they said Samantha told them she gave Sophia away. The little girl was reported missing on March 8.
Police tracked down the mom and arrested her at a Newark motel. She pointed them to her boyfriend Dhante Jackson in Merced and it’s at that home where Sophia was found dead in a bathroom on March 11.
Jackson was gone but finally found in Newark over the weekend and arrested.
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Investigators revealed over the weekend that she was malnourished and had been dead for more than a month before her body was found.
“In my 20 years in law enforcement, this case is the most disturbing and horrific I've seen," said Joe Perez of the Merced Police Department.
Detectives said three women helped hide and transport Jackson between Merced and the Bay Area during those 6 months he was evading authorities.
All three face charges for accesory to murder after the fact.
“Sophia didn’t deserve what she went through. She deserves justice,” said Johnson.
Now, the victim's family is taking legal action against Alameda County.
“That everybody involved is held accountable so that this doesn’t happen to another child,” said Johnson. “And so that they learn that Sophia was telling the truth. I was telling the truth.”
The family said that for months before her death, the county and the formal concerns of abuse raised to case workers by Sophia's family, teachers, hospital staff and even the 8-year-old herself, were largely ignored.
“They discounted what she was saying to them, and they left her with her abusive mother and mom’s boyfriend,” said attorney Carly Sanchez. “And obviously Sophia ended up dead, and that never should have happened.”
NBC Bay Area reached out to the Alameda County Counsel and has written and called Child Protective Services about this case but has not heard back.
The county has 45 days to reply to the family's legal claim before they continue with a formal lawsuit.
