‘The Baby’s Head Is Smashed’ | Deasia Watkins

Welcome back to another episode of Killer Bites, the show giving you bite-sized coverage of true crime stories. My name is Ali, and today I’ll be telling you about the highly disturbing and gruesome slaying of three-month-old Janaya Watkins.

This case contains detailed accounts of the murder and might be one of the most gruesome and disturbing cases that we’ve covered. This bone-chilling case started with a troubling 911 call. A distressed man’s voice is heard speaking to a police dispatcher in the recorded call. It’s clear that he’s panicked and distraught, and we’re about to find out why.

“What… what do you see when you look at the child?” “Look, this lady… I don’t want to describe the thing. This experience is very, very bad. All right? The little lady… the little baby head is open, like open, open. I’m not going in there to touch nothing because I don’t want to mess nothing up. I’m not going in there to look because I already seen it. But it’s not… it’s very violent. It’s a very violent thing.”

This man, Robert, had just arrived at his mother Deborah’s house and stumbled into her kitchen to find a terrible scene. As Robert tries to convey what’s happened to the dispatcher, he’s heard saying that he doesn’t know where his little cousin is. We’ll come to know that his little cousin is a young woman named Deasia Watkins. And as the dispatcher tries to make sense of what Robert is trying to tell them, the horrifying picture begins to come into focus. When the dispatcher asks what happened to the three-month-old baby, that’s when Robert is heard saying, “Lady, the baby is on my mama’s kitchen counter with her head smashed.”

And just a warning to our viewers, this case is only going to get a lot more graphic and disturbing from here, so please watch with care.

Robert begs the dispatcher, “Now I need you to please send the police.” And as he tells the dispatcher this, in the background, you can hear a woman wailing and crying, saying, “She’s dead! She’s dead!” That woman will later be identified as Deborah, Robert’s mother. And then the dispatcher is heard desperately trying to make sense of what happened between Deborah’s cries and Robert’s limited description of a deceased three-month-old baby. A call that no one ever wanted to get, let alone relive.

So what happened? How did this innocent three-month-old soul meet such a horrible and untimely end? Well, to explain this unsettling case, we’ll have to first go back in time a little bit to where it all began.

On December 14th, 20-year-old Deasia Watkins and her boyfriend James Brown welcomed their healthy baby girl, Janaya Watkins. It was a happy time for the couple. Everything seemed to be on the up and up for James and Deasia. Deasia was excited to become a mother, and she wanted to give her baby girl a much better childhood than the one she had experienced. And because of that fact, Deasia was determined to give her child all the love she never received. That’s why no one could have predicted the dark and gruesome events that would take place over the next couple of months.

Things began to take a dark turn around January 25th, 2015, at midnight when police were called to Deasia and James’s apartment. Multiple neighbors had called the authorities and reported hearing Deasia screaming and Janaya crying. So what happened? What could have caused such a scene?

Well, when police arrived at their apartment, Deasia refused to open the door. But when officers threatened to force their way into the apartment, a young man that police would later identify as Chris Gully, James’s cousin, opened the door. And what did the police discover when they arrived? Well, the first thing they noticed was a strong smell. They also noted that Deasia was not acting normal. Her behavior was erratic and strange, and fearing for Janaya’s safety, the officers tried to take the baby away from Deasia. But when they did, Deasia snapped. When the officers tried to take the baby from Deasia, she would not let go of the child, and instead, she attempted to choke Janaya, who at the time was only seven weeks old.

After the incident, welfare check-ins were issued for both Deasia and Janaya. During these checks, the social workers were able to take Janaya from Deasia. Once Janaya was safely removed from the new mother, Deasia passed out on the floor. After that incident, Deasia was moved to a psychiatric facility for care and was put on a 72-hour investigative hold, and it didn’t take doctors long to establish her diagnosis.

So what was the cause of this erratic outburst? The following day, Deasia was discovered to be suffering from postpartum psychosis. Postpartum psychosis, also known as PPP, is considered a mental health emergency. And according to one definition of the diagnosis, it’s a condition that affects a person’s sense of reality, causing hallucinations, delusions, paranoia, or other behavior changes. In severe cases, people with PPP may attempt to harm themselves or their newborn. And clearly, when Deasia tried to strangle her child, the doctors determined she was suffering from this.

Fortunately, this condition is treatable, and early treatment is said to increase the odds of a good outcome. But still, this is a very serious condition. Since the life and well-being of a baby can be at stake, doctors moved forward with putting Deasia on antipsychotic medication to treat her PPP. But due to side effects of the medication, she was informed that she would have to discontinue breastfeeding Janaya. And beyond Deasia’s inability to nurse her baby, healthcare workers expressed concern to Deasia’s caseworker that she didn’t seem to be grasping the seriousness of the situation. According to Deasia’s case notes, her care workers felt like she was minimizing the incident by implying it was no big deal.

But regardless, by January 30th, Deasia was released from the hospital and allowed to return back to her apartment with her baby. However, the hospital did put a strict safety plan in place to keep Janaya safe. So what did the safety plan include? Deasia was only allowed to have supervised contact with her baby, Janaya, but this was under the condition that Deasia took her prescribed medication. The safety protocol also stated that James or his sister had to be present at all times when Deasia was with Janaya.

So was Deasia on board with all these modifications and rules? Well, a visit from a caseworker revealed that she was not willing to commit to the safety plan completely. It turns out that Deasia hadn’t filled a prescription for her antipsychotic medication, so the caseworker reiterated that it was imperative that Deasia take her medication. This care worker reinforced that if Deasia did not take her medicine, it would not be safe for Janaya to stay in the home with her.

Aside from the caseworker’s concerns, James also feared for the safety of Janaya. He made it clear to Deasia that if she did not comply with the safety regulations, that she would have to leave their home. And since the apartment lease was under James’s name, he had the ability to kick her out. With the pressure from the caseworker and James, Deasia reluctantly agreed to their terms. After all, Deasia was desperate to not be separated from Janaya. But in addition to her love for her daughter, she also confessed that she had nowhere else to go.

So was this the end of these disturbing events? Unfortunately, it was just the beginning.

One week later, a caseworker made another unannounced visit to the residence, and at the time of the visit, the caseworker was unable to verify if Deasia had gotten her prescription filled or not. Unfortunately, over the next couple of weeks, things only went further downhill. By February, Deasia had moved out of James’s apartment and into a house with her aunt, Deborah, and for a short time, baby Janaya was in the safety of her father’s care.

But on March 6th, the couple’s custody proceedings began. Because of some murky circumstances, it was discovered that James’s name had been left off the birth certificate. Therefore, he was required to do paternity tests to gain custody. Similarly, because of Deasia’s mental health issues, she still needed to be evaluated again before she was allowed to have custody over Janaya. So both parents were not allowed to assume control over their baby. And because of this situation, Deborah, Deasia’s aunt, was given custody of the young child.

Due to the ongoing court proceedings, neither James nor Deasia were allowed to visit their child. And while they both agreed to the terms, things did not go as planned. During the caseworker’s visit to Deborah’s home, she confirmed that Deborah told her she was not allowing Deasia to visit. But that wasn’t the truth. In reality, things were not what they seemed, and Deborah was not telling the truth about everything happening inside her home.

So what was going on behind closed doors? Well, Deasia had been spending time with Janaya, and not just a little bit of time. Deasia had actually moved into her aunt’s house and had assumed taking care of the baby again. Now, this was clearly in contradiction to the court order and what the doctors had recommended because of her PPP. But nonetheless, Deasia had found a way to be back with her young baby again. See, Deasia had moved into Deborah’s house just days before the court order. And at the time when Deborah was given custody, she was also suffering from personal issues and health problems. Therefore, caring for a baby on her own was just too much for her. So with few other options, Deborah allowed Deasia to stay in her home. But unfortunately, at the time, this caseworker didn’t know any of this.

On March 16, 2015, just three days after the caseworker’s visit to Deborah’s home, this truly horrifying and vile murder of poor Janaya would take place.

A dispatcher received an intense 911 call early on the morning of March 16th. On the call, Deborah is heard saying, “She’s not supposed to be here, Robert,” before begging the dispatcher to send the police. After that, Deborah is heard breaking down into sobs and incoherent ramblings, leaving the dispatcher confused about what happened. Deborah is heard hysterically yelling, “Lord help me,” in the recording of the emergency call.

That’s when the dispatcher asked to talk to the person Deborah was speaking to before she answered the call. And that’s when Deborah says the most haunting thing: “My son… he came over here… he found it. I was asleep.”

So what did Deborah’s son Robert find? That’s what the dispatcher wanted to know too. She’s heard trying to reason with Deborah to calm down, but when that fails, the dispatcher takes a more harsh tone with Deborah. Finally, she was able to get Deborah to calm down enough to explain that her son Robert had come over to her house, woke her up, and told her that baby Janaya was dead. Then Deborah is heard screaming, “Oh my God, I’m going to jail!” and after that, quickly passes the phone to Robert.

Robert is able to more calmly tell the dispatcher that he had arrived at Deborah’s home just minutes earlier with his children, and unfortunately, it was his youngest child who had arrived in the kitchen first, and it was that child who saw the grizzly scene in the kitchen. Seeing what happened, Robert had immediately ushered his kids out of the house to safety. He then re-entered, fearing the worst for his mother Deborah. He told the dispatcher that he found Deborah asleep in bed and told her what happened. He then tried to find Deasia but couldn’t locate her.

But not quite grasping the scene, the dispatcher got firm with Robert and told him, “Okay, I need to know what happened to the baby.” That’s when Robert panics and tells her that he doesn’t know what happened to the baby, that he came into the house and the baby was on the counter. Then he continues, saying that all he did was wake up his mother Deborah and call the police. That’s when the dispatcher asks, “Is the baby breathing?” to which Robert replies, “Listen lady, the baby is deceased.”

I can’t imagine being on the other end of that call and hearing those words. What a haunting and horrible thing to have to witness, and then try to communicate to someone.

Minutes later, the first two officers arrived at the scene. One officer quickly made his way to the kitchen and confirmed that baby Janaya was in fact dead. Meanwhile, the other officer found Deborah in the bathroom. That’s when the two officers radioed to other officers to assist on the scene. Amidst the chaos and confusion, the officers began to clear the home, meaning they checked to make sure no one else was inside the house. And while they were clearing the house, officers located Deasia.

So where was she when they found her? Well, Deasia was in her bed in her room, tucked under her covers. When officers entered her room, it was a mess. A broken lamp, books on the floor, and cluttered everywhere. Seeing Deasia in bed, officers pulled the covers back, and without a word, Deasia was handcuffed and moved to the hallway. Deasia remained under the watch of another responding officer, and the rest of the home was cleared without any other incident. But Deborah and her family could not remain in the house while the police did their investigation, so the family was moved to the criminal investigation section where they were put in interrogation rooms. And this is where the details of what happened in Deborah’s home would start to be revealed.

A video of Deborah and Robert shows them walking into an investigation room. In the footage, Deborah can be seen crying hysterically and repeating, “They might as well kill me.” Robert tries to console his hysterical mother, telling her, “You ain’t done nothing wrong.” Deborah continues to unravel and yell out for help, to which Robert replies and tries to get her to calm down, but Deborah continues to scream and cry on the tape. Finally, the detective tells Robert that he has to leave the room so they can question his mother. Reluctantly he leaves her, and Deborah lets out another cry.

Deborah’s screams and cries can be heard all the way into the next room where Deasia had been placed to wait for detectives. On a police videotape of the interrogation room, Deasia is shown humming to herself while she waits to be questioned. The hum is haunting and almost childlike. She shows next to no emotion. Could she be in shock, perhaps? Or maybe in the clutches of an episode brought on by her PPP? It’s hard to say, but it’s not what someone would expect from a mother who just found out their baby was murdered.

Meanwhile, in a nearby interrogation room, Deborah is inconsolable. She continues to say that she doesn’t think she can live through this horrible situation, and while the detectives try to calm her down, she can’t be comforted. The stark contrast between the two women’s reactions to the tragedy is disturbing.

Nearly two hours passed before detectives finally came into Deasia’s room at the police station. And in the video, Deasia can be seen remaining stoic and seemingly unfazed by the horrifying reality that her baby is dead. In fact, Deasia calmly waits for detectives with her head on the table. When the two detectives enter the room, one of the detectives asks her, “Are you DD?”—clearly a nickname for Deasia. The detective introduces herself, but Deasia barely lifts her head off the table before putting it back down. Her movements seem oddly young and detached.

The detectives run through a gamut of different strategies and tactics to get Deasia to speak, but she remains silent. Even when detectives read Deasia her Miranda rights, she still said nothing. Detectives try and ask if Deasia understands what the detectives had read to her, but it’s clear she’s not going to speak. Not only is Deasia silent, but she barely moves her head or body to acknowledge the detective’s presence in the room. They try to ask her if she’s okay or if she needs anything, but Deasia remains hauntingly still and devoid of emotion.

Determined to get some kind of response from Deasia, the detective scoots her chair over towards Deasia. She stares her right in the eyes and tries asking her simple questions like how to spell her name. But nothing the detective does seems to snap Deasia out of her catatonic state. Lastly, the detectives plead with Deasia that they want to help her. They repeatedly tell her that they can’t help her if she doesn’t talk. The detectives try both soft and firm tactics, but nothing is working. You can see in the video how desperately the detectives want to get answers from her, but Deasia will not relent. Finally, the detectives have no choice but to abandon the investigation and simply take photos and retain her clothes for evidence.

Shortly after the detectives leave Deasia, a new team arrives to take photos of her. They tell her to go ahead and stand up, but she refuses to respond. So finally, the detectives order someone to make her stand up. An officer helps Deasia up and photos are taken of her. Then the officers retain her clothes in another room as potential evidence. Then, returning to the confession room in her new clothes, despite all this interaction with the investigators, Deasia still refuses to speak. After the detectives re-enter, they run through the entire book of interrogation tactics again, but all prove to be ineffective to get Deasia to respond. And after six hours, they’ve gotten nowhere with Deasia, and the meeting comes to an end.

After the detectives were unable to get any information from Deasia, she was transported to a psychiatric unit where she once again received treatment for her PPP and was kept for observation.

Three days later, Deasia is returned to the station to meet with detectives again, which is just three days after baby Janaya was found dead in Deborah’s home. But this interview goes a lot differently than the previous one. In the video, Deasia appears to be slightly more animated, and when asked by two male detectives if she’s handcuffed, Deasia immediately responds, which is already an improvement. The detective then offers to take the cuffs off Deasia. This time, when asked if she’s right or left-handed, Deasia answers right away again. So things are already off to a much better start for detectives, and it’s clear even Deasia’s demeanor is in stark contrast to the previous interview.

Once again, the detectives read Deasia her Miranda rights, and this time Deasia signs the form that she understands her rights. Wow, quite the difference in just a few days. And after some general questions, the detectives begin to work towards untangling the web of lies that led to an unthinkable horror. The detectives start off by telling her that they are going to ask her some simple questions about her life before the incident. The detective then says, “What I’d like to do is just go back, okay?” He then proceeds to ask Deasia about her history with James and how they became a couple. The detective presses on, asking Deasia about the apartment she shared with James.

The interview begins to take a turn when the detective brings up the January 911 call at Deasia and James’s apartment. When asked if Deasia remembers the incident, she tells the detective that she does not. The detective responds again, asking, “You don’t remember that very well?” Deasia continues to say no, and this would be a common answer throughout this interview, until it was not.

The detective pushes forward, determined to get to the bottom of what happened and what kind of circumstances would ever lead to the death of a newborn baby. The detective asks again if Deasia remembered being at the psychiatric hospital in January, but she continues to tell the officer that she does not.

Three days earlier, Deborah was asked by detectives about Deasia moving into her house. In this interview, Deborah was assisted by her sister Cindy because she was so distraught. Cindy described the circumstances that led to Deasia coming to live with Deborah. She said that Deasia had called her Aunt Deborah crying and asking to be picked up. So Deborah went and picked up Deasia and let her move in. Meanwhile, in Deasia’s interview, the detectives clarified with Deasia that Deborah, in fact, did come to her apartment and help her move out, and Deasia confirms this chain of events, therefore effectively going against the court orders.

The detectives tried to clarify with Deasia about this fact. “You were staying there while all this stuff was happening with the courts?” Again, confirming that Deasia was there despite being ordered not to be. Deasia again says yes.

Then the detectives asked a question I was curious about too. They asked her why James wasn’t on Janaya’s birth certificate. You remember, this is why James was not granted custody of Janaya. The detective asked Deasia if James and her had a fight that led him to be omitted from the birth certificate. Deasia explained that he had an ID that had expired, and since it expired, the hospital supposedly said they couldn’t put James’s name on the certificate. And due to this issue, James had failed when he filed for custody. A simple mishap that could have prevented a horrible tragedy. So much of what happened later might have been preventative if James’s name was just on that birth certificate.

Next, the detective tries to get information about Deasia’s medication. He asks her if she was on medication when she went to stay with Deborah, to which Deasia says she was in fact not taking it. The detective then asks, “Were you supposed to be taking medication?” and Deasia admits yes, that she was supposed to be on medication. Meaning Deasia knew that she was supposed to be taking her pills for the PPP. Again, Deasia went against court orders. The detective then asked Deasia why she didn’t want to take her pills. Deasia tells the detective that she just didn’t want to take them. The simplicity in the answer is so childlike.

Detectives ask Deasia how long she was staying at Deborah’s house before Janaya came to stay, to which Deasia says two weeks. The detective confirms then that the court gave custody of Janaya to Deborah, and Deasia confirms this chain of events. And while it’s clear that the cops suspect Deasia of being complicit in the crime, they gently try to lead her in that direction. Clearly, they’re afraid to scare her back into silence.

Three days earlier, in the interview with Deborah, Cindy, Deborah’s sister, explains on Deborah’s behalf that during the court case for custody of Janaya, she spoke with a lawyer. And by the time she came back to speak with her sister Deborah, she found out that the court had convinced Deborah to take Janaya. Cindy said she told Deborah that she would try to help with the child, and that Deborah was hesitant to take on the responsibility for caring for Janaya, but that she also didn’t want to see the baby go into a foster home. But it was clear that Deborah didn’t feel like she was equipped to handle the full responsibility of a newborn baby. And maybe that was why she made a tragic decision that she would later come to regret forever. Cindy explains that Deborah got custody of the baby, and that even though she knew Deasia was not supposed to be near the baby unattended, she let her take care of the child.

Back in Deasia’s interview days later, Deasia is heard saying that she broke the court rules because she missed her baby. Then detectives really dig into what led up to that fateful event in Deborah’s house. The detective says on the night that police came to the house, Deborah had already explained that she gave Deasia the baby, and Deasia agreed that this is what happened. So when did things go wrong?

The detective asks Deasia if the baby was asleep in the crib or the bed the night of the tragedy. Deasia answers that the baby was in a crib in her room. The detective then says they had found a broken lamp in her room, and he asked Deasia if she knows how it got destroyed. But Deasia says that she doesn’t know how the lamp broke. Finally, detectives say that obviously, at some point, something bad happened with the baby. Then he finally asks if Deasia remembers what happened, but Deasia simply says no. The detective then asks Deasia, “How did the baby get into the kitchen?” to which Deasia says, “I don’t know.”

During this whole interview, she remains calm, and her voice is soft and childlike. It felt like the detectives were interviewing a little girl around eight or nine, and not an adult woman. Then the detectives ask Deasia if she thinks her aunt did something to baby Janaya. That’s when Deasia finally says yes.

Well, that’s a twist, and not what we were expecting to hear. The detective says once again, “So you think it was Aunt Debbie?” and again Deasia says yes. So detectives ask her, “What do you think she did?” and Deasia calmly says, “Killed her.” The haunting lack of emotion is completely chilling.

Detectives realize that Deasia and Deborah were the only two women in the house when Janaya was killed. So detectives now had to figure out what exactly happened and who was ultimately responsible for the horrible crime. Detectives momentarily explored the possibility that Deborah could be guilty. They put together that perhaps Deborah’s dwindling health, mixture of her own medications, and the responsibility of caring for a child could have caused her to snap. In Deborah’s interview, she is heard saying, “I can’t live with this on my conscience.” Now, these could have been the words of someone who is guilty of a terrible crime, or someone who broke a court order that could have protected Janaya, and detectives were determined to figure out the truth.

In Deasia’s interview, detectives asked her how she thought Deborah killed her baby, to which she replied, “Stabbed her.” Then detectives asked if Deasia knew what Deborah stabbed Janaya with. Deasia then says that the knife was in the baby’s hand when she saw Janaya. This fact becomes very important later on. Detectives ask Deasia to clarify, so she repeats that the knife was in the baby’s hand. The detectives ask Deasia if she saw the baby, but Deasia says that she didn’t see the baby, which is clearly a contradiction to her previous statement. Things were not adding up for the detectives. How would Deasia know about the knife if she hadn’t seen the baby? How would Deasia know how Janaya was killed if she hadn’t seen her?

The detectives then asked Deasia to fill in the holes in her story. They asked Deasia to explain how Janaya went from being a healthy baby to being injured and dying in the kitchen. Deasia tries to blame the incident on her aunt’s sleepwalking. Well, that clearly doesn’t seem like a reasonable explanation of what happened, and it doesn’t appear the detectives think so either.

This is where the detectives get tired of entertaining Deasia’s stories and finally began to really dig in to figure out what happened to young Janaya. They tip their hand, revealing that they know Deasia had the knife in her hand, and slowly reveal that they have found her fingerprints on the weapon. But despite the evidence against her, Deasia continues to deny that she hurt her baby. Even with evidence right in front of her, Deasia will not admit to her crime, and detectives realize that evidence against Deasia will not be enough to get her to confess.

The detective then takes another angle with Deasia, explaining to her that Deborah was asleep when Janaya was harmed. And he goes on to say that Deborah also had no blood on her hands or her body. And then the detective asks again if Deasia thinks Deborah is the one that hurt Janaya, and Deasia says yes. But detectives are not convinced.

Not getting where they want to go, the detective finally asks Deasia why her clothes were covered in blood. The photos the detectives had taken of Deasia days earlier showed that she had blood spots all over her clothes, face, and body. Again, the detective tries to persuade Deasia to confess, but she does not. So they scrap a logical approach with Deasia and try a more emotional one.

The detective is seen asking Deasia, “Do you know the difference between a bad person versus a bad thing?” From a psychological perspective, most people consider themselves to be good. So if you can get a person to separate what they did from defining their character, then perhaps you can get them to confess to a crime. And that appears to be the angle the detectives are employing here.

Detectives double down, telling Deasia that there are bad people out there. Then he goes on to say there are people out there who are not bad, but who do bad things. This honestly seems like a line out of a movie, but there’s a reason why this tactic is used: it can be effective. The detectives stress that there’s a big difference between bad people and people who do bad things. And the detectives then double down, saying they’re just trying to find out what happened. They then ask, “Do you think something was going on that caused you to do this?”

Clearly, the detectives were trying anything to get Deasia to confess, and it seems to work. Deasia is heard saying to the detectives, “They were just trying to take my baby.” The detective clarifies, “People were trying to take your baby from you, and that upset you?” to which Deasia says yes. The detective continues to Deasia, “So you thought if you did this to your baby, then nobody could take it away from you?” Deasia replies, “I didn’t do nothing to the baby.”

And again, Deasia denies her part in Janaya’s death. So detectives then try a new approach with Deasia. The detective tells Deasia, “I don’t think you wanted anything bad to happen to the baby,” then goes on to ask Deasia if she agrees that something very bad happened. They explain that what happened to the baby was caused by someone with very deep feelings. Detectives again try to implicate that Deasia is to blame for this crime. They then plead with Deasia, saying that if she could help another mother who also suffered like Deasia did, wouldn’t she want to do that? They then add, “You know Aunt Debbie didn’t do this.”

Then the detective says to Deasia, “Do you just not want to believe that you did it?” to which Deasia replies, “Yes.”

This is a clear breakthrough for the detectives, but it’s beyond heartbreaking to witness a woman who is suffering from mental health issues to try to grapple with this horrible situation. And it’s beyond tragic that it all happened in the first place.

Detectives then ask Deasia what happened that made her so upset the night that Janaya died. They asked her once again how she ended up with so much blood on her. The detective tries to dig in deeper with Deasia’s loved ones, hoping that some mixture of tactics will get Deasia to confess to the horrible crime. The detective tells her that while he doesn’t think she’s a bad person, he does think she’s responsible for a bad thing. And he underlines this statement by saying that all the evidence points to Deasia killing her baby. He then goes on to say that Deasia needs to accept responsibility and deal with the consequences of her actions. The detective pleads with Deasia to confess so that the family can move forward.

Finally, the detectives state, “Aunt Debbie didn’t do the sleepwalking, did she?” and Deasia says no. Then again, he asks Deasia, “What set this off? What happened?” Clearly, the detective is trying to uncover the spark that caused the massive explosion of violence that ended in the death of baby Janaya.

Finally, Deasia gives a different answer. The answer that detectives knew, but still, it was haunting to hear. Deasia says that she took baby Janaya into the kitchen and killed her. And thus all the denials stop. Detectives finally have their confession. But why did this happen?

Detectives pushed Deasia further to get more answers, and detectives get the full picture of what happened when Deasia finally agrees to describe the horrible events. Once again, we do want to give a warning to our viewers that it’s an incredibly graphic and disturbing account of events.

Deasia goes on to tell the detectives that she took Janaya to change her diaper, and at that point, Janaya started screaming and crying. So Deasia said she couldn’t change her, and instead, she threw Janaya across the room. Deasia says that Janaya didn’t die with the impact, so she picked up Janaya and banged her head into the bookshelf four times. Then she says she picked up a stick and hit Janaya in the head four times. But Deasia says that her baby was not dying fast enough, so she says that she went into the kitchen to kill her, to finish her off.

She then recounts that she took a knife and stabbed her in the head. Deasia says that she told Janaya to “die, die.” Then she says she stabbed her in the eye, but the baby was still twitching, so she says she just cut off her neck until she died.

After this horrifying confession, the detectives asked Deasia how many times she had cut Janaya to get her neck severed, and she simply says, “Until it sliced off.” The other detective follows up, asking Deasia why she needed to both stab and cut off the baby’s head, and all Deasia says is, “She wouldn’t die.”

The detective asked how Deasia knew that Janaya wasn’t dead, and Deasia says, “Because she kept breathing and moving around.” Then he asked Deasia what she did with the knife, and Deasia said that she put the knife in Janaya’s hand. And when the detectives asked why she would do that, Deasia replies, “So that it would look like she did it.”

Then detectives asked Deasia what she did after that, to which she replies, “I went back to my room.”

And horrifyingly, Deasia’s account of events was consistent with the evidence the police found at Deborah’s house. But detectives still didn’t understand what could have prompted Deasia to commit such a horrifying crime. The detectives asked Deasia, “What made you do that?” and all Deasia can say is, “I don’t know.” They then asked if she feels bad about what she did to Janaya. Deasia answers, “No.”

After that, Deasia was arrested, but the question of why this happened was never really answered. The only reasonable explanation that some could draw was that Deasia’s PPP remained untreated and thus caused the outburst. And according to the Hamilton County prosecutor, Health and Family Services did their jobs. The prosecutor’s office said they followed court orders finding a relative to care for Janaya and checking on her multiple times, but clearly, social workers didn’t know that Deasia had moved into the aunt’s home about a week before Janaya’s tragic murder took place.

In Deasia’s initial plea in response to her aggravated murder charge, she pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. But the presiding judge ordered that she receive psychiatric treatment, and it was later determined that she was competent to stand trial after receiving the required treatment. However, a trial date never came. In February of 2017, Deasia pleaded guilty to the murder of Janaya. She received a sentence of 15 years to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 13 years.

The tragedy of this case is apparent. It’s awful that something so gruesome could happen to someone so young, and we want to extend our compassion to the family that endured this horrific chain of events. That’s all I have for you today. My name is Ali, and thanks for watching Killer Bites.