16-Year-Old Sibling Charged With Killing Anna Kepner

The 16-year-old stepbrother of high school cheerleader Anna Kepner has been charged with homicide as a juvenile in connection with her November death aboard the Carnival Horizon, according to court documents reviewed by CBS News. The detail surfaced not in a criminal filing but in an emergency motion in a separate custody battle between the teen's parents. An attorney for the stepbrother's father wrote Friday that the boy, identified only as "TH," was charged on Feb. 3 in the Southern District of Florida, according to social media posts by the family. Investigators determined 18-year-old Kepner, found under a bed in the cabin she shared with the stepbrother, died of mechanical asphyxia on Nov. 7.

Federal prosecutors and the FBI, leading the probe because Kepner was a US citizen who died in international waters, have declined to comment, but CBS reports a sealed case against the teen is pending before US District Judge Beth Bloom, and the boy appeared in her Miami courtroom on Feb. 6. Authorities had previously been investigating him in Kepner's death; law enforcement sources told CBS they believe she may have been strangled during a confrontation and that alcohol may have been involved. Officials allege a bar hold was used, per the Guardian. The boy has reportedly said he can't remember anything of the time in question.