Audrii Cunningham

Case background and investigation

Audrii Cunningham was an 11-year-old girl from the Livingston area of Polk County, Texas. On the morning of Thursday, February 15, 2024, she left home for school but did not board the bus at her neighborhood stop, and school officials reported that she never arrived, according to CBS News Texas. An AMBER Alert was issued the same day.

Investigators quickly focused on Don Steven McDougal, then 42, whom news reports described as a friend of the family. According to CBS News Texas and FOX 26 Houston, he lived in a camper behind the home Audrii shared with her father and grandmother, and he sometimes drove her to school or to the bus stop. McDougal was arrested on February 16, 2024, on an unrelated aggravated assault charge, and authorities publicly described him as a person of interest. Witnesses had linked his dark blue 2003 Chevrolet Suburban to the case, CBS News Texas reported.

On February 20, 2024, Polk County Sheriff Byron Lyons announced that Audrii's body had been found in the Trinity River near US Highway 59. Officials said that cellphone analysis, video footage and information provided by McDougal had led searchers to several locations of interest, one of which was where she was found. KWTX later reported that a large rock had been tied to her body with rope that matched rope from McDougal's vehicle. Her remains were sent to the Harris County medical examiner, which determined that she died of homicidal violence with blunt head trauma, according to FOX 26 Houston and KPRC.

At the February 20 news conference, Polk County District Attorney Shelly Sitton said an arrest warrant for capital murder was being prepared. According to KPRC, a grand jury indicted McDougal in April 2024 on two counts of capital murder.

On Friday, January 17, 2025, McDougal pleaded guilty to capital murder at a special hearing at the Polk County Judicial Center and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. KPRC reported that he pleaded to the second count of the indictment, that the state abandoned the first count, and that four other pending cases against him were dismissed as part of the agreement. Bluebonnet News reported that the agreement also waived his right to appeal. Members of Audrii's family, including her father and grandparents, gave victim impact statements in court.

The district attorney's office said it did not seek the death penalty because a review of McDougal's records showed significant documented intellectual and developmental disabilities, which under Texas law restrict eligibility for capital punishment. The district attorney said the plea spared the family a prolonged trial and appeals process. FOX 26 Houston also reported that McDougal had an earlier conviction for enticing a child but had not been required to register as a sex offender because of the terms of a plea agreement in that case.