FRIENDS, FAMILY SAY GOODBYE TO SKYLAR KAUFFMAN

IT WILL be a sad day in suburban Philadelphia today as friends and family say goodbye to Skylar Kauffman. The pretty 9-year-old was raped and murdered, allegedly by a neighbor, last week after she disappeared from the parking lot where she was playing.
Her funeral will be held today in suburban Montgomery County. Last night the Grade 3 student was remembered fondly as a little girl who loved swimming and dancing and always had a big smile.
Family friend Lana Goldstein said: "She was just a happy, great, fun loving, little girl. She used to come to Lutheran Community and visit

SKYLAR KAUFFMAN: TROUTMAN LOCKED HER IN HIS APT.

KILLER?

TERRIFIED and surrounded by pictures of naked women Skylar Kauffman and her friend realized her alleged murderer, James Troutman had locked them in his apartment after offering to: "show them his bird."
But three weeks to the day before her death, the nine-year-old and her pal were able to escape from his Philadelphia, PA apartment where cops later found a pool of her blood and a single shoe of hers. The girls went willingly, but when they saw the pictures, when Troutman offered to show them his "bird," and when they

SKYLAR KAUFFMAN MURDER: JAMES TROUTMAN NABBED

P.M. UPDATE: POLICE in Pennsylvania have charged a 24-year-old man with first-degree murder in the sickening sex slaying of 9-year-old Skylar Kauffman. Sources say James Lee Troutman, a neighbor, confessed to the murder. The little girl went missing Monday and her body was found around midnight, wrapped in a blanket and dumped in a trash bin. She had been sexually abused and strangled. Police sources say Troutman wasn't very hard to find: he was in the vicinity and had blood on his shoes.

MURDER OF SKYLAR KAUFFMAN, 9, 'TERRIBLY VIOLENT'

A SEARCH for a 9-year-old Philadelphia-area girl has ended in heartbreak. The body of Skylar Kauffman was discovered in a  dumpster around midnight Monday after detectives followed a bloody trail. Cops have arrested a 40-year-old neighbor and expect him to be charged within hours in the "terribly violent" slaying.
Skylar had been playing outside her parents apartment in suburban Souderton Monday when she disappeared. But when the man grabbed her in the sex-fuelled attack, cops say she put up a heroic struggle that may ultimately send her killer to his death.
Police chief James P. O'Leary told Fox 29: