German National Charged with Drowning Grandson on St. George Island

Police said a 71-year-old German woman vacationing on St. George Island drowned her grandson, then tried but failed to drown herself in the frigid Gulf of Mexico while her husband was shopping.

Marianne Bordt was charged with first-degree murder and booked into the Franklin County jail at 1 a.m. Tuesday.

Investigators allege Bordt drowned her grandson, Camden Hiers, in the bathtub Monday afternoon while her husband, Heinz Bordt, was running errands.

She "stated she had killed the grandson because she didn't want to see him grow up in a divorced home," according to a bizarre Franklin County Sheriff's Office arrest affidavit.

Heinz Bordt told investigators he went to Apalachicola to do some shopping about 2 p.m. He asked his wife if she wanted to go with him, but she said she'd stay with the boy, according to the report.

When Mr. Bordt returned about 4:30 p.m., "he noticed the front door was standing open, and his wife coming from the beach wearing a red jacket and female long underwear," a deputy wrote. She apparently was wet from the neck down.

When he asked his wife what was wrong, "she said that she tried to kill herself in the ocean," the report said. Then she said she'd killed Camden.

Mr. Bordt said he went into the house and saw Camden partially submerged, face-down in the bathtub. He pulled him out, put him on the living room floor and left to drive to the local fire station for help.

Mrs. Bordt tried to run from the parking lot at that point, according to the report, but Mr. Bordt forced her into his back seat. She scraped her knee in the struggle.

When EMS and law enforcement made it to the house, Camden was pronounced dead.

Both Bordt and her husband are German nationals. The Roswell, Ga., address on the booking form is the last known address for the child and his mother, as well as Mrs. Bordt.

Mrs. Bordt immediately was placed on suicide watch at the county jail.

The Sheriff’s Office and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement are investigating the apparent murder.

An autopsy was performed at 1 p.m. today by the Leon County medical examiner’s office. Bordt is slated for a first appearance at 3 p.m. today at the Franklin County Courthouse.

The German consulate in Washington, D.C., has been notified.

A phone call to the boy's mother in Roswell was not answered Tuesday afternoon.

The boy's father's attorney, however, released a statement on behalf of the family Tuesday.

"I would be willing to state that David Hiers is extremely distraught and overwhelmed with grief over this incident," said Alpharetta, Ga., attorney J. Thomas Salata. "He and his family ask only for thoughts and prayers during this very difficult time."