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Teen accused of killing 5-year-old cousin, faking abduction

Tiffany Van Alstyne is led to a police vehicle after her arraignment in Knox town court on Friday, Dec. 19, 2014, in Knox, N.Y. The 19-year old has been accused of killing a 5-year-old cousin in her care and then calling in a false report that two masked intruders took the boy from their Albany-area home. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)
This undated photo provided by the Albany County Sheriff's Office shows Kenneth White, who was found by a sheriff's K-9 unit conducting a search in the rural hamlet of Clarksville, 10 miles southwest of Albany, N.Y. New York police said Friday, Dec. 19, 2014, that a caretaker's initial report that the 5-year-old boy was abducted from a mobile home on a rural road in Berne, N.Y., before being found dead nearby hours later, was false. (AP Photo/Albany County Sheriff's Office)
Tiffany Van Alstyne is led from Knox town court after her arraignment on Friday, Dec. 19, 2014, in Knox, N.Y. The 19-year old has been accused of killing a 5-year-old cousin in her care and then calling in a false report that two masked intruders took the boy from their Albany-area home. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)
The home where a 5-year-old boy was abducted on Thursday is seen through trees on Friday, Dec. 19, 2014, in Berne, N.Y. Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple told local media at about 3 a.m. Friday that the body of Kenneth White was found by a sheriff's K-9 unit conducting a search in the rural hamlet of Clarksville, 10 miles southwest of Albany. No other details have been released. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)
A police officer checks camera footage at a Stewarts Shop in New Scotland after a five-year old Kenneth White was abducted by two masked men from his home in nearby Berne, setting off an Amber Alert, on Thursday, Dec.18, 2014. (AP Photo/The Daily Gazette, Patrick Dodson)
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By JOHN KEKIS ASSOCIATED PRESS
December 19, 2014 - 4:14 pm
 

BERNE, N.Y. — A 19-year old New York woman is accused of killing a 5-year-old cousin in her care and then calling in a false report that two masked intruders took the boy from their Albany-area home.

Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple says Tiffany VanAlstyne is being arraigned on a second-degree murder charge in the killing of Kenneth White.

He says VanAlstyne strangled the boy and tossed his body “like a piece of trash” into a culvert across the street sometime before making the bogus 911 call Thursday afternoon in the town of Berne.

VanAlstyne’s parents have been the legal guardians of Kenneth, his twin sister and a 4-year-old sister since September.

Apple declined to comment on a motive. It wasn’t immediately known if VanAlstyne has a lawyer.

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