6-Year-Old Boy Is Killed Holding Onto Mom’s Car When She Tried To Abandon Him

On February 28, 2021, Brittany Gosney told the Ohio police the worst possible thing a mother could say. She reported her six-year-old son, James Robert Hutchinson, had gone missing. Officers with the Middletown Division of Police issued an alert to locals to keep an eye out for James as they went about their daily activities. Police had hope that they would reunite James with his mother; then, the most shocking realization came to light.

Before long, Middletown police learned that Brittany and her boyfriend had not been telling the whole truth about James’s disappearance. Unfortunately, Brittany and her lover, James Hamilton, knew exactly where James was but did not want to share that information because it was incriminating. Nevertheless, the police figured it out and learned that six-year-old James was already dead at the time when Brittany and her boyfriend reported the boy missing.

So where was little James? Police later learned that he had been killed in Preble County a few days before he was reported missing. The boy’s corpse was brought back to Middletown, where he was dumped into the Ohio River.

As police started uncovering the details of the investigation, things got worse and worse for James’s mother. She told the cops that she initially planned to abandoned James and her two other children in a public park at her boyfriend’s request.

However, James managed to grab onto Brittany’s car before she could drive away from the scene. He clung to the vehicle and was dragged along until Brittany’s driving ended the boy’s life. Yes, he was dragged to his death while trying to get back to his mother.

Nevertheless, mom wanted to get away with the killing. She went to the police and reported James and the two other children missing. Police believed the mother and her boyfriend and launched an aggressive search for the missing children. But when police spoke to boyfriend James Hamilton, they realized that the two stories were not the same. Someone was telling a lie and not sharing the truth.

In a series of Facebook posts and updates, the Middletown Division of Police wrote an “alert” for the missing children: “We have a missing six-year-old named James. He is was last seen in the area of Crawford St.  He is a white male, 3’ tall, 42 lbs. He has dark blond/reddish hair and blue eyes. He was last seen wearing a red shirt with blue and red Batman pajama pants. If you see him, call 911.”

The police shared subsequent updates. The first update was, “We are no longer looking in the Crawford Street area. New information has led us outside the city limits. Thank you for your assistance.”

The details of the incident are horrifying. Police claim that the mother and her boyfriend drove the three children to the remote Rush Run Wildlife Area around 3 am and abandoned the children. James was six, while the other children were ages seven and nine. Brittany planned to leave her children in the wilderness area because her boyfriend wanted her to.

“Brittany stated she had planned to get the kids out of the vehicle and to leave them behind as Hamilton had been pressuring her to get rid of the kids,” the police report stated. “When doing this, the 6-year-old, Hutchinson, grabbed onto the door handle. Brittany slammed the gas trying to leave the kids and drug Hutchinson, possibly running him over.”