Parents Charged With Murder Of 5-Year-Old North Canton Girl

The Parents of 5-year-old Ashley Zhao from North Canton, have been charged in connection with her death.

Ashley recently went missing from a Jackson Township restaurant. The Ohio Attorney General’s Office issued a missing child alert for Ashley but her body was later found “deceased and concealed” inside the restaurant.

Police have reported that the 5-year-old’s mother, Ming Ming Chen struck the child’s head “several times with her right fist” which resulted in her death.

Liang Zhao

After this, the father, Liang Zhao, reportedly saw that Ashley had “green fluid coming from her mouth.”

He then took her into the bathroom inside the restaurant, washed her face and noticed that she had stopped breathing. Zhao performed CPR on the child but was unsuccessful in his attempt.

Originally, the parents told the police they had last seen their daughter in a back room at 4:30 p.m. the day of her disappearance.

This week Ming Ming Chen was arrested and charged with murder and felonious assault while Ashley’s father was also arrested and charged with complicity to murder as well as complicity to commit felonious assault.

After the discovery of Ashley’s body, Police searched the family’s apartment. The full circumstances around the child’s death are still being investigated.