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William Ruben Ebron Jr. pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter of a child and three other charges in the Jacksonville, Florida, case of 21-month-old Lonzie Arin Ray Barton, receiving 20 years on the manslaughter count.

Lonzie lived on Jacksonville's Southside with his mother, Lonna Lauramore Barton, 26, and her boyfriend, Ebron, 32. His older sister, then five years old, is not named here. Lonna Barton worked nights and left both children in Ebron's care on the night Lonzie disappeared.

At about 2:20 a.m. on July 24, 2015, Ebron called 911 and reported that his 1995 orange Honda Civic had been stolen from outside the apartment with Lonzie asleep in the back seat. He reported the stolen car first and the missing child second, saying he had briefly gone inside to put on a movie. Police found the abandoned Civic within hours near the apartments, but Lonzie was not inside. Hundreds of officers searched for about a week without finding him.

Prosecutors later said Lonzie was already dead when Ebron called 911. Assistant State Attorney Rich Mantei said the adults had shut the children downstairs and gone upstairs together before Lonzie drowned in a bathtub. Mantei said Ebron found the child face down in the water, attempted CPR and staged the disappearance.

Ebron was arrested on July 24, 2015, initially on child neglect and lying to police. Court documents say that at about 9 p.m. he told detectives he wanted to show them where the victim was, then said during the recorded drive that he had meant only to show the route he took. About three months after the disappearance, detectives repeatedly pressed him for the body's location, telling him, "You're gonna have to tell where that body's at" and "Your silence hurts you more than it helps you." Ebron maintained that Lonzie had been in the stolen car, although the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office had released video showing Ebron abandoning the Civic near his apartment that night.

After giving investigators nothing for about six months, Ebron led them on the night of January 10, 2016, hours before his trial was to begin, to woods off Interstate 295 near Bayard. Remains recovered the next day from a trash pile were identified as Lonzie. The medical examiner could not determine a cause of death because of decomposition. Lonna Barton confirmed that she and Ebron had sex before she left for work, leaving the children with him. Her attorney later said she had invented a pregnancy while jailed in hopes Ebron would reveal where the body was.

Lonna Barton pleaded guilty in January 2016 to child neglect, a third degree felony, and a misdemeanor count of giving false information to law enforcement. On March 4, 2016, Circuit Judge Mark Borello sentenced her to five years for neglect and one year for lying to police, to run concurrently, with 169 days credited. Ebron pleaded guilty before the same judge on February 5, 2016, to aggravated manslaughter of a child, child neglect, lying to police and tampering with evidence. He received 20 years for manslaughter, with concurrent terms of five years for neglect, five years for tampering and one year for lying to police, and 196 days credited. His scheduled release date is September 28, 2037.

Lonna Barton was separately convicted on drug charges in Baker County and sentenced to seven years. Florida's First District Court of Appeal upheld that sentence on May 24, 2019, bringing her total to twelve years. She was released from prison on November 26, 2025. Lonzie's older sister has remained in her grandmother's custody.

The video is a narrated analysis built on police interview-room footage from the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office. It runs about 104 minutes and covers the interview described above.