What is the story of Shaniya Davis? Who is she, and what happened to her?

Warning: This article contains references to child abuse and murder.

In 2009, Antoinette Davis of North Carolina reported her daughter, Shaniya Davis was missing. For a parent, that alone is unimaginable. But what really happened to Shaniya is far worse, and according to CBS News, Shaniya’s mother, Antoinette, was at the center of it all.

After five-year-old Shaniya purportedly disappeared, police immediately suspected foul play. Their fears were confirmed when surveillance video surfaced from a North Carolina hotel showing a man carrying the young girl through the lobby. This was not her abductor, however. Instead, Shaniya’s mother sold her into sex work.

Hopes that Shaniya may yet be alive were dashed when her dead body was uncovered near Fayetteville. By that point, her mother, Antoinette had been arrested for sex trafficking. But to whom did she sell her daughter? And how did the young girl die? Within a matter of weeks, those questions and more would be answered.

Mario Andrette McNeill was arrested

Not long after Shaniya Davis’ body was recovered, Mario Andretti McNeill was taken into custody and charged with her murder. It was determined Shaniya had been raped and strangled. What motivated Shaniya’s mother, Antoinette Davis, to do the unthinkable — offer her own daughter up for sex work — was a simple drug debt of just $200, The Fayetteville Observer reported.

As the investigation revealed, McNeill had been previously involved with Antoinette’s sister. Around the time Shaniya disappeared, McNeill was under the influence of substances when early one morning he entered the Davis’ home. That same morning, Antoinette reported her daughter missing, but at first she claimed she didn’t know what had happened to her.

After falsely accusing her boyfriend, Antoinette admitted she offered sex with her daughter to pay back money, not to kill her. As of 2019, Antoinette was serving at least 17 1/2 years, while McNeill was on death row.

Further controversy

The death of a child who had been sold into sex work by her own mother is terrible enough, but an even darker side to the Shaniya Davis story is that both North Carolina law enforcement and local social services made several missteps in the weeks and months leading up to her murder and assault. If things had gone differently, Shaniya might still be alive.

According to the Winston-Salem Journal, for example, local authorities failed to communicate signs of abuse to one another. By 2017, new procedures and rule were established in the area to help address shortcomings in how Shaniya’s situation was handled, and to hopefully better protect children going forward

Sadly, Shaniya had only just recently gone to live with her mother. Per The Fayetteville-Observer, Shaniya’s father, Bradley Lockhart, had hoped Antoinette could finally be a mother to Shaniya. Prior to that point, “[Antoinette] was never part of her life,” Lockhart said.

If you know someone suffering from sexual violence, contact RAINN or the National Sexual Abuse Telephone Hotline at 1-800-656-4673.