Officer Dismembered Foster Daughter’s Body, Officials Say

After fatally beating his foster daughter last month, a San Bernardino police officer dismembered her body and scattered the remains in several remote areas of the Inland Empire, authorities disclosed Thursday.

The revelation by the San Bernardino Police Department was the latest twist in a bizarre saga that began when the officer, Craig Armstrong, reported that 3-year-old Alicia had disappeared from a shopping mall July 28.

Nine days later, Armstrong and his wife, Tammy, were named suspects in her death when blood-stained towels and other evidence were found by authorities at the family’s Colton home.

The officer stunned his colleagues last Friday when he hanged himself with a dog leash in a relative’s garage. Armstrong left behind a two-hour videotape, filmed at his lawyer’s office,on which he confessed to killing Alicia while punishing her for going into the kitchen. Alicia was one of two girls the couple were adopting.

Police spokeswoman Sherrie Guerrero said the videotape contained Armstrong’s statement that he had dismembered the body. That information was not released earlier, she said, because investigators wanted to inform Tammy Armstrong first.

Tammy Armstrong, a nurse in Loma Linda, is no longer a suspect, Guerrero said. During his videotaped confession, Craig Armstrong repeatedly said his wife knew nothing of the killing.

The child’s remains have not been found. Guerrero said investigators have come up empty-handed after searching areas identified by Armstrong on the videotape.

A six-year veteran of the department, Armstrong was most recently a motorcycle officer and was described by some supervisors as a model policeman. He once appeared on the cover of a police recruitment brochure.