The State - News from Nov. 17, 1988

A man who had been questioned after the body of a 6-year-old girl was found last year in the foothills near Taft has been charged with molesting and murdering the child. Authorities said there was insufficient evidence then to charge Lloyd Richard Cooper, 19, of Taft with murdering Desiree Montgomery, but investigators later developed additional evidence leading to Cooper’s arrest, authorities said. Investigators said Cooper was an acquaintance of the girl’s family and was staying at her uncle’s home at the time she was killed.