MIDDLETOWN, Ohio — Middletown police released a video from the interview where detectives questioned the Middletown woman who admitted to killing her 6-year-old son back in February.

The video amounted to more than three hours of footage from the interview in which Brittany Gosney initially said she did not recall picking her son up and taking him downstairs during the day of his death.

RELATED: Middletown mother pleads guilty to murder in death of 6-year-old son

Gosney pleaded guilty to murder in a Butler County courtroom on Aug. 16. A judge recently sentenced the mother to life in prison for the death of her son, James Hutchinson.

Police said Gosney confessed she dragged her son to death as he clung to the minivan she drove. Gosney was trying to abandon James and two siblings in a park when the incident happened.

RELATED: Prosecutor: More than confession is needed against Middletown mother accused of killing 6-year-old son

The police video showed Gosney denied involvement in the incident for more than an hour during her initial interrogation with police.

"I need to know what happened with your boy, with your 6-year-old," said Det. John Hoover in the video released by police. "I'm gonna be real up front with you about this at this point. You need to be very smart. Honesty goes a long long way with me. If there's any criminal charges in the future, honesty goes a long way."

Hutchinson was missing during the time of the investigation. It was later learned Gosney had dumped his body in the Ohio River after his death. Authorities have not yet found the 6-year-old boy's body.

It was not until Det. Hoover told Gosney that her boyfriend, James Hamilton, was blaming her for the death of her son that her story changed.

"James told me to get rid of the kids," Gosney said in the police video. "I took them to a park to make him think I was gonna get rid of 'em."

Police said it was the park where James Hutchinson died as Gosney drove off as he clutched her van door.

"He got up and fell back down. I kind of may have probably hurt his knee on the ground and he lost his balance," Gosney said. "He tried to catch his balance. He didn't get to and he fell."

Police said Gosney then later confessed that she and Hamilton drove down Interstate 275 and put her son's body in the Ohio River.

A judge will sentence Hamilton for his part in disposing of James Hutchinson's body on Oct. 4. He faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.

Hamilton pleaded guilty to charges of kidnapping, endangering children and gross abuse of a corpse.

MIDDLETOWN, Ohio — A Butler County grand jury on Friday added a bevy of new charges to prosecutors’ case against Brittany Gosney, who confessed to killing her 6-year-old son, and her boyfriend, James Hamilton, who stands accused of helping her conceal and dispose of the first-grader’s body.

Gosney, 29, now faces a single count of murder, one count of involuntary manslaughter, one count of tampering with evidence, five counts of endangering children, three counts of kidnapping, three counts of abduction and two counts of gross abuse of a corpse.

Hamilton, 42, stands charged with three counts each of kidnapping, abduction, endangering children, tampering with evidence and gross abuse of a corpse.

According to police, Gosney had attempted to abandon 6-year-old James Hutchinson and his two second-grade siblings in Rush Run Wildlife Area on Feb. 27. A Preble County Sheriff’s Office report indicated Hamilton had been pressuring her to get rid of them.

She took the children to Rush Run and let them out into the parking lot, then attempted to drive away. Hutchinson tried to hold on to her car.

He died after being dragged and possibly run over, according to police and court documents. Prosecutors said Gosney loaded his body into her car along with his living siblings, drove them back to her Middletown home and concealed Hutchinson’s body overnight.

She and Hamilton would drive an hour away to Lawrenceburg, Indiana, to dump the body in the Ohio River, according to police.

They next attempted to report Hutchinson missing, but discrepancies in their stories led to their arrests and Gosney’s confession.

Listen to this episode of the Hear Cincinnati podcast in the player above.

This week on the Hear Cincinnati podcast, host Brian Niesz is joined by community reporter Lucy May and senior manager of enterprise/investigative Meghan Goth to discuss a new nonprofit that’s working to fight hunger, a Black-owned burger spot prospering from West End’s gentrification, a 3-year-old attacked with a knife, and more.

Next, Brian is joined by WCPO reporters Courtney Francisco and Kristen Swilley to explain what happened to James Hutchinson, the 6-year-old whose mother confessed to killing him as she tried to abandon him.

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LAWRENCEBURG, Ind. —

The search continued Friday for two boys believed to have been thrown in the Ohio River and just after 8 p.m., a Dearborn County water rescue team came in with a boat after dogs sniffed out a "possible target."

Friday's search was supposed to end around 8 p.m. but after possible detection, lights have been lit in the area as investigators continue their work.

A few dozen volunteers joined North Star Search and Recovery and Ohio LandSAR in Lawrenceburg in search of 3-year-old Nylo Lattimore and 6-year-old James Hutchinson.

"It just felt like the thing to do. I'm a mom, and sitting at home, there was nothing I could do. So, I wanted to come out here and help search," said volunteer, Kelley Workman.

Peter Ehoodin also volunteered his time.

"It's the thing to do. I'm retired. I can't sit at home and watch it, so that's why I'm here," Ehoodin said.

Crews planned on searching 86 acres of land called the Oxbow.

"This was one of the main areas that we wanted to get to, and we absolutely could not get to it. We couldn't even get the water cadaver dogs in there," said North Star spokesperson, Tracey Campbell. "We kept thinking the water was going to subside. It would dry out, but then we'd get another day of rain."

Now, the floodplain near the Carol Cropper bridge is dry.

That's the bridge where Middletown police said James was thrown into the river by his mother and her boyfriend in February. Investigators said the couple tied a concrete block to his body before they threw him in.

Investigators in Hamilton County said Nylo was tossed in about 17 miles upriver by his mother's boyfriend in December.

"We're not going to stop until we succeed in our mission, and it's to bring those boys home," Campbell said.

OXBOW, Ind. — Crews have been searching for the bodies of 3-year-old Nylo Lattimore and 6-year-old James Hutchinson for weeks, but their search Friday for the two missing Tri-State boys ended with no sign of them.

The search was called off at 9 p.m. Earlier, search crews had a possible hit when three K9s marked a potential area of interest. Dearborn County Water Rescue began to investigate, but the team left the water at 8 p.m. Search dogs then lost the scent, and crews had to call off the search as darkness fell.

"Whatever it was, has broken free and gone down the river some," said Tracy Campbell with North Star International Search and Recovery.

There's no word yet on when the search will pick back up. Campbell said the result of Friday's five-hour search was disheartening.

"You hope, and do what you do, because you want to find and bring people some closure," she said. "But you know what? We'll keep trying."

Investigators believe the boys were both dropped in the Ohio River, and divers have combed the river for weeks. Now that early spring flooding has receded, crews are searching on land that had been underwater.

"If you were on the bridge, you may look down from the bridge, and think you're over water. You were. But part of it was land that was submerged by rain. So you may have thought you dropped something in the river," Campbell said.

The group of volunteers and search experts continued their operation in Oxbow, Indiana downriver of the Carroll Lee Cropper Bridge, hoping to cover about 86 acres on horseback and on the ground.

“It's big, a lot of land. That's not even covering the entire Oxbow area we want to cover. I'm not sure we'll have the people needed today to get it done,” Campbell said.

Investigators believe Nylo Lattimore was put in a body bag and thrown into the Ohio River by 21-year-old Desean Brown, the man accused of killing Nylo’s mother 29-year-old Nyteisha Lattimore in early December 2020. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

Authorities said Hutchinson’s mother, 29-year-old Brittany Gosney, admitted to killing the boy after trying to abandon him in a Preble County park. As she attempted to leave him in the park, Hutchinson held onto her car, which dragged him as Gosney drove away, she told police.

She then took the boy’s body home to later drop it in the river near Lawrenceburg, Indiana. Gosney and her boyfriend, James Hamilton, face dozens of charges, including murder, involuntary manslaughter, gross abuse of a corpse, endangering children and tampering with evidence. Both have pleaded not guilty.