The legal guardian of a 15- year-old girl whose body was found badly bruised and emaciated was charged last night with first-degree murder as authorities investigated what appeared to be an extended period of torture and captivity.

When paramedics arrived Wednesday afternoon at the Southeast Baltimore home of Satrina Roberts, they found the body of Ciara Jobes on the kitchen floor. Ciara's body, which was covered with cuts and bruises, weighed just 73 pounds.

"It's the worst I've seen during 18 years of homicide investigations," said Detective Marvin Sydnor. "This kid was treated worse than an animal. She was nothing but skin and bones."

Roberts, 31, who was also charged with first-degree assault, was being held last night without bail at the Central Booking and Intake Center.

Detectives said Roberts told them that she had locked Ciara in a dark room without heat because she did not know how to discipline the teen-ager.

Roberts told police that in recent weeks, she had beaten Ciara with a tree branch and extension cords.

Roberts told police that she had not allowed the girl outside the house since last summer and that recently she could hear Ciara dragging herself across her room.

The girl was so malnourished, police said, that she probably did not have the energy to stand up.

Roberts, who is 5-foot-4 and weighs 184 pounds, had a fully stocked refrigerator, police said.

On Wednesday, Ciara defecated on a comforter, Roberts told detectives. The guardian lost her temper and beat the child with a leather belt for 15 minutes, police said. Roberts summoned paramedics to her house after becoming concerned about the girl's health.

Yesterday, medical examiners ruled the death a homicide from "multiple injuries" stemming from neglect.

Ciara went to live with her guardian amid an effort to save the girl from a neglectful mother. An infant daughter died of a cocaine overdose in 1989, court records show.

Roberts, a family friend, was granted custody of Ciara in January 2000 by a Baltimore Circuit Court judge after more than a decade of juvenile court proceedings concerning the child's welfare.

Ciara's relatives said Roberts, nicknamed Trina, eventually became a controlling figure and did not allow the girl to attend the funeral of her mother, Jackie Cruse, who suffered from cancer and AIDS and died in July.

"When we asked her why [Ciara] was not allowed to come, she said she was being punished," said Iva Cruse, 54, Ciara's grandmother. "Now we see why.

"I'm feeling anger, I'm feeling grief, I'm feeling hatred, I'm feeling despair," said Cruse. "I want revenge, but the Bible says, 'Vengeance is mine, so sayeth the Lord.'"

Cruse said she had fought unsuccessfully to gain custody of Ciara. She now cares for the girl's two half-brothers.

The brothers had been in and out of foster and group homes and were eventually returned to their mother, relatives said. When Jackie Cruse grew sick last winter, they went to live with their grandmother.

Ciara's 12-year-old half-brother Cornell recalled a brief contact with his sister last year - the last time he would talk to her.

"She called us. We saw it on caller ID," Cornell said. "I started dialing that number. I heard somebody in the background, Trina, say, 'Hang up the phone.' I kept calling her. Every time I called, no answer."

Annette Jackson, Ciara's paternal grandmother, said she last saw the child at church in January or February.

"We hugged," said Jackson, 64. "She was in a happy mood."

But Jackson said the moment was but a brief and isolated contact with her granddaughter, who was not allowed to visit without Roberts' permission.

Though outside supervision of Ciara's life ended nearly three years ago with the judge's order, court records show, there were signs of trouble and school officials had been trying to track her down.

Ciara had attended several city schools in recent years and was assigned to attend Patterson High School this fall but never showed up for classes, said Vanessa Pyatt, a school system spokeswoman.

Pyatt said school officials began trying to find out why the girl was not attending school with a phone call to Roberts on Oct. 21. But the family's phone had been disconnected.

Administrators followed up with letters to the girl's home on Nov. 7 and Nov. 19, Pyatt said.

"We never received any response," she said.

The case was referred to the courts for action as a truancy case, she said. A court date was set for Dec. 4, but the guardian did not appear, Pyatt said.

"The next step would have been a home visit," she said.

Pyatt said she did not immediately know whether the visit had been made or even scheduled.

Ciara attended 10 city schools, according to Pyatt. At the last one she attended, Southeast Middle, Ciara was "frequently absent," Pyatt said.

School administrators who knew Ciara described her as a "quiet student who stayed to herself and did not have many friends," Pyatt said.

For two years, Roberts had been leasing the unit at 1207 Gregor Way in the O'Donnell Heights public housing project, a densely populated community. Neighbors said yesterday that they knew the girl but did not realize that she was being maltreated.

A girl whose apartment faces Ciara's said the teen-ager stayed to herself and did not attend school.

"I would go over there and see what she was doing," said the girl, whose mother requested that her name not be published. "Ciara stayed to herself. She stayed in the house a lot. She was an inside person. She was happy sometimes, and sometimes she was sad."

The girl said she never asked Ciara why she was sad or why she stayed cooped up in her guardian's house so much.

"She never talked about her conditions over there," the girl said, adding that Ciara wore wigs but she didn't know why.

Ciara was born in August 1987 to Jackie Mae Cruse, who was 18 and unmarried, according to court records.

In the next decade and a half, Cruse lived at at least a half-dozen addresses, records show.

Cruse was charged with a handful of mostly minor criminal violations during that time, including second-degree assault and possession of marijuana, court records show.

In April 1995, Cruse filed a petition for child support against Ciara's father, Irvin Lee Jobes, an East Baltimore man 11 years her senior.

Jobes did not contest that he was Ciara's father and two months later signed a paternity consent judgment in which he agreed to pay $51 a week in child support, court record show.

But Jobes failed to make any payments for at least five years, records show. Jobes could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Sun staff writers Eric Siegel and Walter F. Roche Jr. contributed to this article.