An Atlanta man has been charged in the 2006 slaying of a 30-year-old Roswell mother whose body was discovered in an abandoned Forsyth County farmhouse.

Sheriff Ted Paxton said Monday that Elijah Ames Britton, 39, faces one count of murder in the death of Octavia Nicole Atkins.

Britton is in custody on unrelated charges in Clayton County, authorities said.

A land surveyor found Atkins’ body on Aug. 22, 2006, in the old farmhouse. An autopsy indicated she died as a result of ligature strangulation.

Paxton said Monday that authorities did not find the item used to kill her. He declined to speculate on Britton’s motive.

He said Atkins was last seen Aug. 19, 2006, when she dropped off her children, then ages 6 and 9, at her father’s home in Norcross. She supposedly was going to meet Britton.

Paxton said her car was found about a block from Britton’s home off Metropolitan Parkway in southwest Atlanta.

Authorities identified Britton as a person of interest, Paxton said, and developed a case against him.

"In November of 2008 we were able to receive the results of DNA testing from a private lab, which has resulted now in the charges against Mr. Britton," Paxton said.

Atkins’ husband, Deondre Shabazz, was eliminated from suspicion at the time of her death because he was in the Union City jail. He is now in Pennsylvania, where he is being held on federal charges, Paxton said.

He said Britton will be brought to Forsyth County to appear in Magistrate Court on the murder charge.

Paxton said Britton is in Clayton County facing a kidnapping charge in connection with the May 2007 disappearance of Chastity Jones from her South Fulton County home.

Jones was tied to a tree, Paxton said, but escaped and identified Britton as her kidnapper.

She disappeared again in August 2008, a case authorities are investigating as a possible homicide, Paxton said.

Before she went missing the first time, Jones told authorities she had last seen her husband, Brutus Jones, leaving their house with Britton, Paxton said.

Brutus Jones later was found slain in Union City.

Paxton added that he thinks Union City and Fulton County authorities are "looking at [Britton] very strongly as a person of interest" in Brutus Jones’ death.