Man charged with murder of UK schoolgirl

In this undated handout photo provided by the Metropolitan Police, missing schoolgirl Tia Sharp is seen, August 8, 2012 in England. / Getty Images/Handout

(AP) LONDON - The partner of the grandmother of a missing British schoolgirl has been charged with the 12-year-old's murder.

Meanwhile, police have apologized to Tia Sharp's mother after they failed to find the girl's body in her grandmother's house the first three times they searched it.

UK police search for missing schoolgirl

Scotland Yard is blaming "human error" and has apologized for "the distress and concern" caused by the delay in finding the body, which was discovered Friday in the house — the girl's last known whereabouts — one week after she disappeared in south London.

Stuart Hazell, the 37-year-old partner of Tia's grandmother Christine Sharp, has been charged with murder and will appear in court on Monday.

Two others, a 46-year-old woman arrested on suspicion of murder and a 39-year-old man suspected of "assisting an offender," have been bailed to return to a London police station.

[Rejco100]

One murder of a little girl from London gets worldwide coverage, unlike in the USA where little girls are brutally raped, buried alive, and murdered & thrown in dumpsters daily barely makes the back page news....

[Little_Old_Lady]

Daily? Really?

[jennc1980]

I believe I agree with Lerianis4. I cannot imagine Scotland Yard is that incompetent. Whoever planted the body there did so after the third search wrongfully assuming there would be no more.

[Lerianis4]

Let me get this straight: they searched the grandmother's home three times and didn't find the body, yet the fourth time they did?

Sounds to me like the body might have been planted in the grandmother's home by someone with access.