BANGOR, Maine (AP) — Police charged a 20-year-old Maine man with murder Tuesday in the death of a 15-year-old girl who was last seen more than a week ago, when she went to meet someone she met on Facebook.
Kyle Dube, of Orono, was charged in the death of Nichole Cable of Glenburn after a body presumed to that of the girl was found in a wooded area Monday night, Maine State Police Lt. Christopher Coleman said during a news conference.
When he was charged, Dube was already in jail after turning himself in to the Penobscot County Sheriff's Department on Friday on an unrelated charge, Coleman said.
After the news conference, a 16-year-old who described herself as Nichole's best friend said Dube had met Nichole a couple of months earlier. He planned to see Nichole the weekend she went missing, before he had to report to jail, said the friend, Tyler-Ann Harris.
Harris, who met Nichole this year at Old Town High School where they were students, said she'd never met Dube and wasn't sure of their relationship status. She said Nichole wasn't fearful of him.
"She was really happy even though she went through a lot of hard stuff in her life. She always knew how to see the bright side of things," Harris said, using a tissue to dab tears in her eyes. "She didn't always get along with people, and she had an attitude. But that's a teenage girl. And she was just happy all the time."
The body was found at about 9:30 p.m. Monday by a warden who was searching the woods with a dog, officials said. The exact location was not disclosed.
Although positive identification is pending, authorities believe the body is that of Nichole, who was last seen by her parents on May 12.
The body was being turned over to the medical examiner for positive identification and to determine a cause of death.
Nichole's mother has said that she last saw her daughter when she said she was going out to meet someone she knew from Facebook, but didn't know who that person was. She has pleaded for her daughter to come home, saying she won't be in trouble.
Dozens of law enforcement officers, using aircraft and dogs, and hundreds of civilian volunteers have spent days searching for the teen.
"This initially started as a missing person's case and sadly it's transitioned to a homicide investigation," said Penobscot County Sheriff Glenn Ross.