UPDATE: Dead Child Identified as Missing Affton Boy

The body of one-year-old Tyler Dasher was found less than a mile from the Affton home where he toddler was reported missing earlier today, police said.

Police have confirmed that the dead child is Tyler Daniel Dasher, reporting missing at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday from the 7730 Clevedon St. The cause of death has not yet been determined, but a St. Louis County Police press release calls the death an "apparent homicide."

At 3:30 p.m. area residents walking their dog found a child's body at the edge of New St. Marcus Cemetery and Mausoleum along Des Peres Parkway. When police called a press conference at the crime scene, the area had been cordoned off with police tape, and traffic on Des Peres Parkway was blocked north of Gravois Road. Orange barriers were set up to block the body from view. Later the medical examiner trasported and indentified the body.

"Rest assured, we won't stop investigating until we get to the bottom of this," St. Louis County Police Chief Fitch said at the press conference. "At this point, there are no particular suspects nor have we eliminated any suspects."

Police search for missing toddler

The sounds of crying mixed with the barking of K-9 police units and the hum of news helicopters in Affton today as police searched for missing toddler Tyler Dasher near his home in the 7700 block of Clevedon Street.

Police issued a St. Louis Area Regional Amber Alert and searched the neighborhood for what they believed was an abducted child, St. Louis County Police Spokesperson Rick Eckhard said.

"We have been searching for the last three hours and we are pretty convinced that this child could not have gotten out of the crib, out of the room and out of the house on their own accord, especially considering the blanket the child was sleeping in was missing also," Eckhard said. "We believe this could possibly be an abduction and we want to increase the area search."

Eckhard said Dasher's mother, Shelby Dasher, contacted police around 11:30 a.m. because she noticed the child was missing from his room when she woke up this morning. She last saw the child when she put him to bed at about 11 p.m. Monday.

The home showed no signs of forced entry, Eckhardt said, but police were not yet able to confirm whether the house had been locked overnight.

Police also said they have a report from a witness who saw a white man wearing a dark hoodie and dark pants carrying what appeared to be a child in a blue blanket, the color of the missing child's blanket, in a wooded area near about a mile west of Dasher's home. Eckhard said the witness came forward with the information at around 12:30 p.m.

"We are treating it like an abduction," Eckhard said.

The child's father, Joseph Ellington, did not live with Tyler and his mother and grandmother, police said, but the South County resident was located later on Tuesday. Both parents were speaking to county detectives at the police precinct.

KSDK is reporting that Tyler's mother filed a restraining order against Ellington in October 2010. She cancelled the order a month later.

Police said Tyler was one year old, blond hair, blue eyes, 2 feet tall, 20 pounds and wearing pajamas with red, blue and green trucks and the word "trucks" on them. The boy's blanket was blue, with soccer and footballs on it.

The child had a "red cherry" birthmark on his left shoulder, Eckhard said. 

Additional officers, the FBI, K-9s and the SWAT team were all helping in the search. Around 100 total county officers were involved, as well as St. Louis Metropolitian Police who first responded to the River Des Peres crime scene.

"Our greatest concern is the first few hours which can really make the difference," Eckhard said on FOX 2 early in the afternoon. "We have creeks around here, we have ditches, we have cemeteries so there are a lot of places we are looking right now."

Online updates

Updates are being posted on a Facebook page called Tyler Dasher Updates and on Twitter @TylerDasherUpda. Or search the term #missingafftonbaby on Twitter.