Sheriff: Uncle of slain North Carolina girl tracked down 4 years later

BAYOU BLUE, La. — Police in Louisiana on Friday arrested a North Carolina man accused of raping and killing his 5-yearold niece in that state more than four years ago.

David Wesley Prevatte, of Lumberton was arrested Friday in Bayou Blue, Louisiana, Lafourche Parish Sheriff Craig Webre said in a news release.

He said North Carolina’s Pender County Sheriff ’s Office tracked Prevatte to the community 43 miles southwest of New Orleans after getting a warrant accusing him of first-degree murder and first-degree rape of Paitin Fields in November 2017.

A police spokeperson said he did not know whether Prevatte, 23, had an attorney who could comment.

The girl died Nov. 16, 2017, three days after her family took her to a hospital, unresponsive.

North Carolina news outlets reported she was Prevatte’s niece.

“An autopsy showed signs of sexual trauma and strangulation,” and detectives identified Prevatte as a suspect in June 2018, the news release said.

Prevatte pleaded guilty the following March to unrelated charges of intimidating a witness, breaking and entering, larceny, and burning a building, and spent about 10 months in prison. He was released in January 2020.

The warrant against him also accuses him of committing a sex offense against a child.

He will be extradited to Pender County, Webre said. He complimented “the tenacity and professionalism ... that led to the arrest.”

Said Pender County Sheriff Alan Cutler: “This has been an ongoing investigation and I am extremely pleased and proud of the effort that has been put into this investigation by my personnel.”