The mother of murdered Florida teenager Danika Troy says her 14-year-old daughter was lured into the woods by one of the boys now charged with killing her, a teen she believed had romantic feelings for her.

In an interview with the New York Post, Ashley Troy said 16-year-old Gabriel Williams “pretended to have feelings for her,” leading Danika to trust him enough to follow him into the wooded trail where she was ambushed. 

“That’s how she was lured,” she said.

Williams and 14-year-old Kimahri Blevins have both been charged with first-degree premeditated murder in Danika’s death.

FAMILIES CLAIM TEEN MURDER SUSPECT WAS ‘PLOTTING’ DEADLY HIT-AND-RUN FOR MONTHS BEFORE KILLING TWO GIRLS

Ashley said she is still desperate for answers. “I still need answers. I’m just left asking why,” she told the outlet. “She just wanted to be in love.”

Danika was reported missing by her mother on Dec. 1. The next day, a passerby discovered her body in a wooded area in Pace, a community in Florida’s Panhandle. Investigators said she had been shot multiple times and set on fire.

Authorities quickly identified the alleged killers, two teens who knew Danika from school, and took them into custody.

MOTHER SAYS ALLEGED STALKER WHO KILLED HER DAUGHTER SHOULD BE TRIED AS AN ADULT

Detectives initially believed the murder may have stemmed from a social-media dispute over Thanksgiving break. According to the sheriff’s office, the boys claimed they targeted Danika because she had blocked Blevins on social media and called Williams “worthless and a gang banger.”

Ashley rejected that narrative. “What those boys said is an excuse,” she told the Post.

Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson confirmed Thursday that Danika’s body had been positively identified and said investigators rapidly zeroed in on Williams and Blevins. Both suspects had prior “run-ins” with law enforcement, he said, though details were not released because of their ages.

TEEN MURDER SUSPECT ALLEGEDLY SWATTED VICTIM’S HOME WEEKS BEFORE DEADLY HIT-AND-RUN: LAWYER

Johnson described the killing in stark terms. 

“This is where it gets really horrific,” he said, explaining that Williams allegedly stole his mother’s handgun before shooting Danika. “It’s bad enough you kill a 14-year-old. You’re 14. You’re 16. Shoot her multiple times, and then they set her on fire.”

The motive for the killing remains unclear. Johnson said the explanations the teens offered “don’t fit the forensics or any facts of the case,” adding, “so we don’t have a legit motive.”

REPEAT OFFENDER ALLEGEDLY KILLS 14-YEAR-OLD GIRL, HAS CRIMINAL HISTORY DATING BACK TO 2000: OFFICIALS

Both suspects remain held without bond at the Department of Juvenile Justice on first-degree murder charges. Prosecutors are coordinating with investigators as they determine whether the teens will be charged as adults.

“If you do an adult crime, you gotta do adult time,” Johnson said.

Ashley previously said she believes “evil influence” played a role in her daughter’s killing, but she wants accountability. She said she wants “nothing less than for them to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.”

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

Fox News Digital reached out to the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office for comment, but did not immediately receive a response. 

Fox News Digital’s Stephen Sorace contributed to this report.

Stepheny Price covers crime, including missing persons, homicides and migrant crime. Send story tips to stepheny.price@fox.com.

Voters in Miami, Florida, cast ballots Tuesday in a runoff election for mayor in a race that’s grabbed plenty of national attention in recent weeks as Democrats aim to end a decades-long losing streak in red-leaning Florida.

Democrat Eileen Higgins, a former county commissioner, is facing off against Republican Emilio Gonzalez, a former city manager backed by President Donald Trump.

While the election is technically nonpartisan, the ballot box face-off has become the latest showdown this year between Democrats and Republicans, with both parties pouring in resources.

And Democrats, energized by last month’s decisive 2025 election victories and by last week’s double-digit overperformance in a special election in a red-leaning congressional district in Tennessee, are aiming for victory in Miami for an office they haven’t held in 30 years.

MIAMI MAYORAL CANDIDATE REVEALS HOW HE WILL FLIP SCRIPT ON DEM RIVAL’S ‘CITY OF RENTERS’ STRATEGY

The Democratic National Committee (DNC) and allied groups have invested in the race.

DNC Chair Kent Martin told Fox News Digital that following last week’s “historic overperformance in Tennessee and the record Democratic momentum across the country this year,” the DNC is now “laser focused” on Miami’s mayoral runoff.

“The energy is on Democrats’ side and the DNC is all-in support of Eileen Higgins from now until Election Day,” Martin emphasized in a statement to Fox News Digital last week.

CLICK HERE FOR THE LATEST FOX NEWS REPORTING ON THE 2025 ELECTIONS

Meanwhile, the Republican Party of Florida has been helping Gonzalez.

And Trump, over the weekend, took to social media to try and boost Gonzalez.

“Miami’s Mayor Race is Tuesday. It is a big and important race!!! Vote for Republican Gonzalez,” the president wrote.

Florida was once the largest of the general election battleground states, but has shifted dramatically to the right over the past decade.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis won re-election by nearly 20 points in 2022, and Trump carried the state by 13 points in last year’s presidential election victory.

But Miami remains a rare blue oasis in the Sunshine State. Trump narrowly lost the city in last year’s presidential election, although the president won the wider Miami-Dade County by 11 points.

Higgins, a mechanical engineer and former Peace Corps director in Belize, focused on the issue of affordability and of making local government work better and faster during her campaign.

González, a veteran and senior adviser at an asset management firm, spotlighted the fight against overdevelopment and called for the elimination of property taxes for primary homes, as he bid for mayor.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

Higgins captured 36% of the vote in the Nov. 4 election, with Gonzalez coming in second at 19%, in the multi-candidate field.

The runoff winner will succeed term-limited Republican Mayor Francis Suarez, who grabbed national attention two years ago as he briefly and unsuccessfully ran for the GOP presidential nomination.

EXCLUSIVE – A North Carolina high school student said she was accused of vandalism by her school and told she was being investigated by law enforcement after she painted her school’s “spirit rock” with a religious and patriotic tribute to slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

According to a new complaint filed Monday and shared first with Fox News Digital, Gabby Stout, a junior at Ardrey Kell High School, called her school’s front office on September 12 to ask if she could paint the school spirit rock with a patriotic message honoring Kirk, who was killed two days prior. Stout was told she could do so as long as the message didn’t contain vulgarity or political speech. 

The complaint states that she and two friends proceeded to paint a heart and an American flag with the message “Freedom 1776,” and a tribute to Charlie Kirk: “Live Like Kirk—John 11:25” on September 13. The students also painted their first names on the rock.

Within hours, school officials painted over the rock, according to the complaint. On September 14, the principal sent out a school-wide message saying that the spirit rock had been painted with a message that was not authorized. The message called it an act of vandalism and a violation of the student code of conduct, saying that law enforcement had been contacted, and an investigation was underway.

RI SCHOOL WANTS TO CHARGE MOM $117K TO SEE CURRICULUM FROM TEACHER WHO CALLED CHARLIE KIRK ‘PIECE OF GARBAGE’

“I was completely shocked,” Stout told Fox News Digital. “I was very intimidated and scared as I had no idea what I did wrong or that I could be getting in trouble for simply sharing and expressing my views and beliefs.”

Stout sent a message the same day to school officials acknowledging she had painted the rock but had been given permission by the front office.

The next school day, she was repeatedly pulled out of class and sent to the principal’s office, where she was questioned and instructed to write a statement about what she had done and then forced to revise it after she forgot to include the Bible verse in her emotional state. She was also told to give up her cell phone to be searched, all without being advised of her constitutional rights or with legal counsel present.

“I was so scared I could barely hold my pen and write it [the statement],” she told Fox News Digital.

The following day, the district announced a revised policy for its Spirit Rock Speech Code that bans all political or religious messages and requires messages to reflect “positive school spirit,” “inclusive values,” and be in “good taste.”

RHODE ISLAND TEACHER WHO CALLED CHARLIE KIRK ‘PIECE OF GARBAGE’ SET TO RETURN TO CLASSROOM AFTER SUSPENSION

The same day, Stout’s mother was told by the principal that the investigation into her daughter had been closed, and no disciplinary action would be taken.

On October 11, the school district sent out an internal message to the Ardrey Kell High School community to “clarify” the principal’s September 14 statement. The message stated that the spirit rock incident was “not an act of vandalism,” “was not a violation of the student code of conduct” and “law enforcement was not contacted to conduct an investigation.”

The complaint alleges that the school’s statement did not acknowledge it had compelled Stout to prepare a written statement without advising her of her rights and said its claim it had not contacted law enforcement contradicted its prior statement to local news outlet WFAE. 

Stout’s parents say the school board has refused to issue a public correction to clear Gabby’s name, despite their repeated requests.

Since the incident, she has faced health problems from stress, alienation and ostracization from friends and fellow students, the complaint says. On social media, the complaint says, Stout was targeted for roughly six weeks with messages from students and others online celebrating the news that she would be investigated and disciplined. Messages celebrated the idea of Stout and her friends going to prison, labeled them as “racist thugs” and left threats like “Die like Kirk.”

The complaint, filed by Alliance Defending Freedom on behalf of the student’s parents, alleges that the school’s actions and policies violated her First, Fourth, Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. It calls for the school to issue a public statement acknowledging these violations, for the school to remove all negative information from Stout’s school records and issue a formal letter of apology.

It also demands the school stop enforcing its vandalism and revised speech code policies regarding the spirit rock, alleging the policies enable viewpoint discrimination.

The school had allowed personal and political messages on the rock before this incident. In 2020, the school allowed students to paint a pro-Black Lives Matter message on the rock. Students painted a “black power” fist symbol along with names of individuals they believed were victims of police brutality, the complaint states. After other students painted over the BLM message, the school board held an emergency meeting and allowed students to repaint the BLM message again, this time with more political messages, including “No Justice. No Peace,” “I can’t breathe” and “End police brutality.”

CLICK HERE FOR MORE COVERAGE OF MEDIA AND CULTURE

FLORIDA TEACHER WINS LAWSUIT, GETS TO RESTORE CHARLIE KIRK POSTER SCHOOL DISTRICT BANNED FROM CLASSROOM

In November, school officials also facilitated a student walkout from class to protest Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) raids, Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Travis Barham told Fox News Digital.

“So they’ll facilitate that kind of left-wing student expression and not just facilitate it, but praise the students who participated,” he said. “But let Gabby express a conservative or Christian view on the spirit rock, and criminal charges fly.”

Stout told Fox News Digital she felt targeted for her beliefs.

“I don’t think it was fair what happened to me because of my beliefs or my views, which are religious and conservative,” she said. “This has never happened to another group that the school district or school has agreed with. I thought that I was going to get in trouble for sharing my views and my beliefs.”

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

The complaint is brought by the student’s parents against the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education. It also asks the court to award nominal and compensatory damages for the constitutional violations, attorneys’ fees and costs and any additional relief the court deems proper.

The Board declined to comment.