3 Year Old Pee’d Herself As She Rot To Death
I want you to attempt to visualize getting your baby girl ready for daycare, packing her snacks, giving her a hug, and kissing her goodbye. Then imagine receiving the crippling news only a few hours later that she would be gone forever. That is the nightmare scenario that 3-year-old Janeire Barnes, her parents had to live through.
[Music] On August the 18th, 2017, Little Janeir got on a van driven by Cornell McGee, who was 27. He was accompanied by his assistant, Lvenia Johnson, who was 29. They were on route to Arms Christian Academy. Everything was in order on the ride over. The kids in the van, just little toddlers at the time, were talking and giggling as they would every day.
Janire, feeling extra tired that morning, fell asleep on the ride. It was just another day on the job for Levenia and Cornell. But they didn’t know that this day would alter the trajectory of their lives. Now, during offloading, Luvenia got each child off the van one at a time while checking off a list with their names on it.
Cornell did the same, double-checking that all the children were off his own transportation log. When Luvenia was done, Cornell looked in his rearview mirror one last time before getting off. Things were going according to plan, but the two employees forgot one crucial thing. You see, later that afternoon around 1:00 p.m.
, emergency services responded to a call regarding a child in possible cardiac arrest at the daycare center. When officers arrived, a woman, Kina Hail, was performing CPR on a small toddler. That was Janeir Barnes. Police took over CPR until medics arrived and the small girl was rushed to West Florida Hospital.
She was pronounced dead within the hour at 1:52 p.m. Officers on the scene needed an answer. How did this child suddenly die while in the care of multiple adults? Kina informed them that she was the night shift supervisor and had been working at the daycare for over a little year. She also happened to be Cornell’s cousin.
She was on her way to get in the van to do her afternoon route at 1:00 p.m. Same as every other day. This is when she opened the door to the van. She saw Janire in the seat lying face down, her arms outstretched towards the door handle. Petrified at what Kina saw, she immediately picked up and ran into the building, screaming for help.
Other employees gathered around as she began performing CPR, though Janire was showing no signs of life. Now, I have the police interviews of everyone involved, so I’m going to play them after the story. Stay tuned. Kina instructed her director, Linda, to call 911. Linda called emergency services, then called Cornell and advised him to come back to work immediately.
Officers were informed that Cornell was the driver of the van and they began to question him at the scene. He said he had written a log of all the children on the van and regarding Janeire told the officers he thought she was off as in out of the van. He looked visibly upset. Police asked why he marked Janeire as off when he hadn’t actually seen her come off.
He told him that Luvenia had said Janeir fell asleep, so he thought she had the toddler taken care of. Cornell himself was the owner of the daycare business from 2011 to 2016. He unfortunately lost his certificate, so the business had to go under new ownership to his aunt Iet Smith. His aunt kept many of the employees, including Cornell.
It was his job that in the morning he would take the school age children to school, then pick up the younger kids and transport them to the daycare. So then officers asked him, “Okay, tell us about your day. What did you do?” He said he got to work around 6:00 a.m. And then around 7:00, he dropped off the elementary students.
At 7:47, he picked up some children, then two more kids at 8:16 a.m. He then picked up Jane and her brother at 8:21 a.m. Usually, he said, Jana sat in the second or third row bag. He also picks up Luvenia in the mornings, which he did after picking up Janer and her brother. He told officers when all the kids were off that morning, he checked the rear view mirror one last time and thought all the children were off the van.
The issue here is that policy for the daycare instructs the person who isn’t offloading the children. They’re supposed to conduct a physical search above and under the seats. In other words, check the van properly. Cornell did not do that even though he made the policy. I mean, he lost his license. Why is he there in the first place? He told officers that he figured Jana would have been able to open the door from the inside if she was too hot.
But it wasn’t her responsibility to open the door and get out by herself. It was their responsibility to ensure she got inside safely. I mean, Janeir was 3 years old. Is she going to know how to get in and out of the car? I don’t think so. Unfortunately, Janir most likely stayed asleep through the immense heat, not realizing she was in danger until she woke up too weak to move.
When detectives searched the van, they found what appeared to be mucus and saliva smeared on the driver’s seat. There was urine everywhere where Jana was laying face down, possibly indicating she wet herself and that she was struggling to breathe. Why is there mucus and saliva smeared on the driver’s seat? The van’s temperature was 120°.
See, this took place in Pensacola, Florida, where it gets extremely hot and humid in the summers. So, that poor girl was trapped in the heat for several hours. So, timing wise, from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. before she was discovered by Kina, who opened the van. It’s not known how long she had been deceased before she was found. She rotted in the car.
She overheated in the car. This was a long, painful death, utter negligence. says, “The doctors determined Janer’s cause of death was hyperothermia, overheating, and her internal temperature was 110° when she arrived at the hospital. Child protective services arrived on the scene quickly and began taking pictures and speaking with investigators.
When they looked at the child’s body, there was no visible trauma, no wounds, or any kind of torture involved. It seems this was simply a fatal mistake that cost the young girl her life. Unintentional as it was, the tragedy was preventable. See, three years prior to this, Luvenia also had a case where she left a child in the car, but nothing was made of it.
This is when officers spoke to Lvenia on the scene. She told them it was her duty to get all the children off the van in the mornings. Luvenia was a teacher at the day school. She had been employed for about 5 years, and she explained she didn’t have a car, so Cornell would grab her after picking up the younger kids.
She recalled seeing Jana in the van that morning and remembered seeing the little girl asleep in her car seat. Luvenia woke her up, unbuckled her, and was attempting to get her and the rest of the children to the front of the van. She told officers she must have laid back down and went back to sleep. The idea that she wanted to take her to the front of the van tells me the entrance into the van is at the front.
Sometimes buses have side doors in the middle. So maybe when the child woke up, the child was trying to walk to the door, but then fell and puked on the driver’s seat. That’s my explanation on how she ended up there. Luvenia told officers the child must have laid back down and went back to sleep.
But she confirmed she never observed Jana getting off the van. And from this, it was Luvenia who is the actual person who supervised who is on and off the van. Cornell was the driver. However, she still insisted she thought Janeir had stepped off and initiated her spot on the transportation log. When the police looked at the log, Janeir was checked as off the van at 8:52 a.m.
But investigators weren’t happy with the lack of explanation and accountability from Cornell and Luvenia. So, they took them both in for questioning. As I said, those interviews are coming shortly. Cornell explained in his interview that he was transporting seven total kids back to the daycare.
Most days after he returns to the daycare, he usually goes into the classroom and begins his route again at 1:00 p.m. when he picks up the children from school. That morning, Cornell left work around 11:00 a.m. to get work done on his car. This was purely a coincidence. Cornell did not know Janer was in the van at this time. Wow.
So, this guy getting his car fixed, not realizing that he’s left a child in a hot van. He also told the police that Jana went to his church and he knew the family well. He said her name always confused him because it’s quite unique. The family would follow Jana out when he would pick her up and they would chat for a little bit.
He knew the parents had just gotten full custody of the girl. He knew that because the grandma would tell him all about the family at the church services. Cornell said they always leave the vans unlocked and that the children are always excited to get into the classroom. So, he was surprised Janer would sleep through it all.
He showed that he was extremely concerned about the girl and didn’t want there to be any harm caused to her. But what’s interesting is at this point when the police are talking to him, he didn’t know that she’d actually passed away. So, initially Cornell and Luvenia were both charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child by culpable negligence.
There were several reasons they received this charge. Neither Cornell nor Luvenia observed Janeir getting off the van. Cornell only looked in the rear view mirror to check the bus before getting off. Neither of them physically searched the van to ensure all the kids were off. Again, it’s just extremely ironic that Cornell was so adamant about this policy and felt such passion about child care and then him not following this policy of checking the van inside properly.
In that moment, he would just been a lazy bastard. So, Luvenia in court pleaded guilty. It was at first recommended she would serve 13 years, but because of her plea deal, her sentence was significantly lowered to 11 months in jail with 10 years of probation. 11 months. I’ve slept longer than 11 months.
This child roasted, literally roasted in the car. 11 months. What? Surprisingly, Cornell was acquitted. He faced no jail time. A decision by the jury that left the family and community somewhat perplexed. The trial itself was highly emotional. Community members, friends, and family all gathered to attain some sense of justice for Janeire.
During one session, the judge played a video showing Cornell parking the van, not getting out, so he couldn’t see who was being pulled off from the van. After Luvenier was done, he pulled the van around the parking lot, got out and went inside. Another shocking video showed Cina running inside with Janire, her lifeless legs dangling and hitting Kina’s body as she sprinted toward the building.
The video caused Cornell to have a mental breakdown where he began loudly sobbing. The family and the community were heartbroken watching the awful video. Another major misstep was that Latasha Branch, one of Jane’s teachers, marked her absent that morning because there is no policy in place at the daycare to cross reference the transportation logs with the attendance sheet.
Serious mistakes with liability can occur, such as what happened to Janer. This was another factor that led to her death. During the trial, Luvenia told the court that throughout all the years she worked there, she didn’t even know what she was signing off on. He asked me to sign cuz he’s my boss.
So, I signed it in reference to the transportation log. What do you mean I signed it? It’s not rocket science, is it, love? And during her cross-examination, she appeared monotone. But there was a news clip from the day of the incident that was played where she said, “I’m not going down for this.” in a very animated fashion.
It’s most likely that Levenia knew right away she messed up. She knew she was going to jail. Her defense attorney thought it was unfair Cornell was allowed to go free while Levvenia had to serve time for the incident. Perhaps it was a different manner in which each of them conducted themselves.
Part of Lvvenia’s sentence was also prohibiting her from working with children during her 10-year probation period, which is still in effect today. But as of today, she’s also been released. And as I mentioned earlier, previous records also showed Levvenia had been cited before for leaving children unattended in a vehicle in 2014.
Finally, the doctor who pronounced Jana dead on the day of the incident told the court she did not have a cardiac rhythm. She was pulseless. This indicated Jana had tragically died hours before she received care at the hospital. The Department of Children and Families issued an emergency suspension of the daycare, shutting it down for at least 90 days as the agency investigated the child’s death.
The owner, Yvet, relinquished her license and paid a fine for violating transportation protocols. The business never reopened. Cornell suffered serious mental health issues and thoughts of deleting himself after the trial. He did contemplate leaving the childare industry. It was upsetting him that much.
I speak to everyone when I say just get the out already. Okay, so let me play the police interviews for you now. The sound isn’t the best, but try and bear with it. We’re going to start with Luvenia. She was asleep when I got on the bed. I woke up and I got out the seat and everything. And I guess as a process of me getting the other kids off the bed, she laid on the seat and went back to sleep.
And is it a normal routine where like the band gets here and you go out and get all the kids? I get I I be on the van. When I get off the van, I get the kids off the bed and I take the kids in. He parks the van. Okay. And I don’t know what happened. I get I make sure I get all the kids off the bed every day. I’ve been doing this for 5 years and I don’t know what happened this morning.
I thought she was off the bed. Oh, this dog. Oh no. Oh Jesus. I don’t understand. So, you don’t remember? I guess you you woke her up. She was like, I was up. She was asleep. I got out the seat. I buckled her. I got out the seat. She came around the seat to like, you know, how you going to get off the bed? She came around that way.
But I guess that’s me getting the process of taking the other kids out the van and walking towards door. She fell back asleep. Okay. And like, was she riding in a car seat or does she fell? She did the like the back the hard back seats. That’s what she was in. Okay. Um and so you remember unbuckling her? I did. And I got her up by her seat. She woke up.
I got up by her seat. I held her head while she walk around towards the front getting ready to get off of me. But I had two other kids coming towards me as she was coming towards me. And I just grabbed them all. And I guess she just laid back down, went to sleep, and I didn’t even get up. The baby was on the front seat and she was reaching like she was trying to reach for the door, whatever.
Her hand was out like this. She was on her knees and her hand was down. So I picked her up. I called her name and I picked her up. She was fine. I just grabbed her and I ran to the daycare. I started calling everybody to open the door and help me. They opened the door and I ran in and I put on the floor in the other room and I wiped her face and I started doing CPR on her.
And while I was doing CPR, Sabrina was calling the police. And um at first I when I when I laid her down, her face was she was full of sweat. I wiped her face and then I started doing the CPR and like snot was just coming out her nose and stuff. And I just kept wiping her nose and kept doing the while she was talking.
They was telling me what to do and I was doing what the man said until they got here. Then when they got here, they took over and I just walked off. What time did you clock in this morning? I clocked in this evening at 12:30. About 12:30 and I went out to the van. It was like 10:03. When you said she was in the front seat, was she in the driver’s seat at She was in the driver’s seat.
I know this is difficult and I’m sorry for having to ask you. She was on her knees in the driver’s seat and her hand was out. She was like on her knees face down and her hand was out like this like she was reaching for the door. Did everything else in the van look? You probably didn’t even notice. But I didn’t pay no attention to nothing else.
I just grabbed her and ran towards the building. When you heard her say that she was asleep, did you ever see her like wake her up, get her up? What I seen I when Ta off the van all I seen was they bent over cuz she was getting the other kids. So I seen her bend over where she sitting. Yeah. Because she because next to her was other children.
She wasn’t on the road by herself. So if she on the road by herself then I would have you know be looking at my rearview mirror or something or whatever to make sure. But she went on the ro by herself. That’s what I’m I’m trying to grasp. I’m not trying to blame her, but I’m I don’t I’m trying to grasp how how this happened because they sits in they sit in boosters.
She sits in her actual highback car seat. So, we have to lock her in. And I I don’t never put the babies in the back. I always put them in the the closest rows. And so when she screamed her name and I was under the pressure she was getting her off, I checked her off. Take off the van. She at the doors and I said, “You got everything?” She grabbed her cuz she don’t never grab her stuff like her phone and stuff.
She’ll leave that in the front seat until she gets everybody off and then she’ll at the double door. She’ll get her stuff and she’ll go okay into the building. Okay. And then I’ll come in and I’ll sign the kids in. Okay. And this particular morning, she did the same thing. Shut the back doormal. Got her front stuff out of the front seat, shut the door, said she was done. She’s going inside.
Um, and then you I guess from the front door, it’s just basically just kind of turning into the parking spot. Yeah. I don’t have a Yeah, I just pull in. Okay. And that’s it. So, I’m checking them all. So, when she screamed her name and said she was sleeping, I just acknowledged that she’s getting there, you know.
And so when she shut the doors, I I pulled up. I I looked in my rearview mirror. I didn’t see nobody. Okay. So I just shut the door. Okay. And you specifically remember looking back this time and I do that’s a routine for me every morning. The only time I get off the van, like I said, if I’m on there by myself, I’ll get off first and then I will I I’ll get the kids off myself.
I’ll check and then I’ll say, “Hey, can somebody check my van?” I’ll just what whoever free I have go check my van and then they’ll come out you know and let me know everything is good and then I’ll you know sign everything off and they’ll sign the clipboard and we’ll park the van okay but most time I don’t have to do that because Tay’s always on the van with me okay so on a a typical like today after you got out of the van came back in what was your routine do you have an assignment like a group of kids or do you have a classroom or Well I I come I mainly come in and
make sure the kids are signed in. So what Tay does is Tay sign off. I sign off as the driver, Tay sign off as the second person. They um when they come in, they didn’t already have the kids going to their classrooms because I’m I don’t park the van. So I’m the last one that comes in. So um by time I get in most time the doors will be locked.
So sometimes when I park the van, the kids are still on the porch cuz they’re waiting on the somebody to come unlock the door. It don’t take, like I said, it take a quick second for me to park the van. And so and most of the time if Linda’s not busy, Linda always come out and meet me. Okay.
So Linda uh come out and we’ll get the kids in. Whoever go to this classroom, we’ll send them to this way. We’ll send them to this way and then I I go sign them in. Okay. And so after everybody’s signed in, then what do you do? What’s your role as then? Class is starting then. So, you have a classroom or do you just kind of float? No, I kind of float.
Um I, you know, I go around the classroom, assist the teachers. Um then I’m back on the van again at 1:00. Okay. Going to pick up children from school. Okay. I’m with another driver, which is Miss Tina, and she drops me off at Pine Meadows because of the van load. So I have to sit there and wait and while she goes to the other schools because they get out earlier than this school.
So I’ll sit with these kids and then she come to get me probably maybe 20 25 minutes later and we we come back and then after that we signing everybody in. Same thing. We checking the vans. We walking around their parents are picking up. Okay. So on today uh when how to your knowledge on what happened, who found her and about what time? I had to leave early today because I had to take my car and go to the shop. Okay.
What time did you leave today? I left today at 11. It was like It was like 11:15ish. 11:20. No, no, no, no. I’m sorry. It was 11:25 when I was standing in the back and I was letting everybody know that I was getting ready to leave. Okay. So, I’m going say about 11:25 and you left for the day. You weren’t coming back. Yeah, I was going. Yeah.
Okay. And who’s since you’re gone today and you’re not doing all the pickups and stuff like that, who was responsible today for pickups? So, Tina’s the driver. So, she was here. Okay. Linda’s normally freed. Okay. The director, she stayed. She’s here while the other while van’s dropping off and stuff.
She was going to drive up to the school and sit and take my spot because breaks had already been done. Today was pretty much a normal smooth day. Everybody haven’t got breaks and everything, so I was able to leave. Okay. Um, who found Janer today? Uh, I’m think she said Miss Tina. Miss Tina was going to the van to get in her van to go. Okay.
Okay. Any questions? When y’all park the van for the day, do you usually lock it? Is it kept unlocked? When we park it for the day, I mean like in the morning we drop off. They they’re always unlocked. Unlocked. Yeah. Okay. Jer, she’s three. Um, do you think would she be able to open those doors? Are they heavy? like the not necessarily the side door.
What about like the two front doors? Do you think she would be able to She’s pretty smart. Janer also go to my church. We I’ve been They’re like family to me. So, she’s pretty pretty smart girl. I believe if she was a woke Well, if she was a woke, we wouldn’t have this issue. But I’m assuming she probably sleep the whole time. that.
And when I left, I remember when I got ready to leave, I remember looking cuz I’m always checking my surroundings. And when I walked out the door, I didn’t go to the vans, but I looked over at Adams and I didn’t, you know, see nobody, you know, waving or standing up or anything. So, I’m assuming she was sleep. Okay.
And you said you leave them unlocked. The vans, they leave them unlocked. Matter of fact, this morning I left the key in the ignition. Okay. Because I know that at one, you know, 1:00 Tina’s going, you know, going to her room. So, I’ll just leave the key in the ignition or I take it out and put in the cup holder.
How big is she usually? Just to get an idea of the vehicle. How big is Janeir? Jane. Jer. Yeah. Okay. She if she’s standing on the van, she’s standing up in the window. Because for one, the van is you inside the van. You’re all and so the door knob and stuff is she’ll be standing kind of above the window. Um, anything else you can think of? And that’s how I know if she when I looked at my rearview mirror this morning, she she must was not sleep because if she was propped up, I was sorry. Okay.
because the way the car seats are positioned and in our vans, I personally wouldn’t bought the big size mirrors to go on top of the norm mirrors because in those 15 passengers that little bit of mirror you barely can see, right? So in those in that van there’s a big mirror about this long that kind of let your view be a little bit w so she must was propped over. Okay.
If she was already out of the car seat and she was starting to help her out and walked around to like another row or so would have been easier to see her if Janir Yeah. would have walked around to another row. Yeah. Like one or two. But Janir knows every she that’s why it was rare that she was sleep this morning cuz every morning Janir know they know they be when they when we pull up they be ready to get up and they automatically go to those dump doors automatically.
What if she was like half asleep though and wanted to go back to sleep and just decided what I’m saying this morning was different but on a normal morning if she was up she wouldn’t have have went to another road. Yeah, because she would have went directly to those double doors. And that’s how I say every morning when she the only reason why I checked her off when I did is because when Taye acknowledged that she was sleep and I you know she was in I’m assuming I was thinking that she was getting her I especially when you killed her name you
know. So now I want to tell you about the case of Tasha Bates. The story is very similar to the one you just heard. [Music] in the deaths of her two sons, three-year-old River and 5-year-old Leland. [Music] Responsibility is something we all share. In today’s true crime video, we will look at the neglectful acts of Tasha Bates.
And I want to ask you, how much is she culpable? Let’s get into it. On July the 18th, 2012, the Bradley County Grand Jury indicted Tasha Bates for two counts of firstdegree felony murder, two counts of aggravated child neglect, four counts of initiating the process to manufacture Met and Fetamine, and one count of promoting the manufacturer of Met and Fetamine.
It’s quite the resume, I guess. This matter resulted in the deaths of Tasha’s sons, River, age three, and Leland, age 5. This took place in the state of Tennessee on June the 28th, 2012. Now, the police discovered the manufacturer of Metampetamine at her residence. Nicholas Glenn Laney, who was employed by the Bradley County EMS, said that on June the 28th, 2012, he responded to a call to the residence of Thomas Kyle.
Thomas was the father of Tasha and the grandfather of the victims. He found one of the victims on the sidewalk in front of the home and the other inside the front door of the residence. Both were unresponsive. The victim’s clothes were soaked, apparently with sweat, and River had warm, pale, moist skin with blue lips and nail beds.
No pulse was detected for River, but Leland was still breathing and had a pulse. Dr. Jeffrey Lynn Miller during the trial testified that he was an emergency room physician at the Skyidge emergency room. He also was the Bradley County Medical Examiner. He described the condition of River when River arrived at the hospital. He was unresponsive, you know, as where we are working on the child.
you know, we are starting IVs and we are doing procedures to the child to try and determine his condition. The doctor went on to say that there was no response to anything that we did. He was completely unresponsive. Dr. Miller said that the standard temperature of any human is 98.6°, but rivers was 109. Dr.
Miller did not believe that rivers playing outside could have caused a temperature as high as that. Carol Hayes Mayo during the trial testified that she was on duty at the emergency department at Children’s Hospital at Erlanganger when Leland was brought in. His core temperature at the time was 104°. Travis Smith testified that he was a patrol sergeant with the Bradley County Sheriff’s Office.
and on June the 28th, 2012 responded to a call regarding Leland and River. He said that the EMS technicians already were at the scene and working on the two victims. One was in an ambulance and the other was being brought out of the house. Initially, he thought it was a drowning call, but Tasha said the incident had occurred on Keith Valley Road.
She said she had not called 911 from that location because she did not have a cell phone and had to go to her father’s house. Charles Dwayne Scoggins, a police officer, testified that he was a criminal investigator for the Bradley County Sheriff’s Office. He responded to a call at 2:44 p.m. to 851 Armstrong Road and immediately went from there to 879 Keith Valley Road where Tasha was living.
At that location, he examined a slip and slide and he went on to explain its condition. He said, “What I noticed initially when I got there, the slide appeared to be relatively dry with the exception of two very small puddles, all of which had dirt and bugs in it. The ground slip and slide was dry.
There was no wet grass anywhere that I could find. And all over, in general, the slip and slide did not appear to have been used in the recent past.” This is important because Tasha claimed that’s where the kids were playing. He first spoke with Tasha at the Skyidge Medical Center emergency room and she said that the victims had been playing outside playing on the slip and slide and when she returned from the house they were in the front yard and unresponsive.
Because of this suspicious circumstance and the police not being convinced of her explanation, they asked her if they could take her blood sample. Tasha then went with the police officer to her house and then later they went together to the Bradley County Sheriff’s Office. She said that she had gone inside her home while the victims remained outside in the yard and when she returned 20 to 25 minutes later, she found them.
She said that she had fixed the victim’s eggs for breakfast, but investigator Scoggins found no evidence that eggs had been cooked that morning. Later, she said that she had been inside the house for 30 to 35 minutes. He asked her the whereabouts of her cell phone, and she responded she thought it was in her car, which was then in possession of the sheriff’s department.
He said that he examined her cell phone and found that it would ring straight through to the Bradley County 911 center. In other words, her phone was available to use. Tasha did not explain why her phone had been found in the trunk of her car. River’s core body temperature was around 109° and the autopsy found that he had no food in his stomach.
When investigator Scoggins told Tasha of the autopsy findings, she responded that the information she had previously given was accurate. Although it was possible that the victims had been under the front porch instead of in the yard. But then later she changed her story a little by telling the police she found the victims in her car.
Describing her younger child, River to be in the front passenger seat of the vehicle with that seat laid completely back and that her older son Leland was partially hanging out of the right rear passenger door. Now, the initial 911 call to dispatchers by her father, Mike Kyle, the grandfather of the children, he indicated the children had possibly drowned.
Kyle also indicated the children were red in color. He then told 911 dispatcher Chris Willis the children were turning purple. Then two search warrants were executed at Tash’s residence. The first on July the 3rd, 2012 was to conduct a temperature study to determine the maximum temperature in Tash’s car where she said she found the children.
The next search warranton executed approximately 2 weeks later was to search for the manufacturer of Met amphetamine. Essentially, they wanted to re-engineer the temperature inside of her car to see how it would change and also find out, well, you know, why were the drugs here? Regarding the temperature experiment, investigator Scoggin said that the temperature on June the 28th, 2012 was 101° and on July the 3rd, when they conducted the experiment, it was less than that.
The car was parked in the same location as on June the 28th. And the purpose of the experiment was to measure the outside temperature and that at different locations in the car using seven or eight thermometers. Every 30 minutes, each thermometer was read for the temperature shown and was photographed. The conditions on the day of the test were the same as on June 28th, except for the lower outside temperature.
At 1 p.m. on the day of the test, the ambient air temperature inside the car was 129 degrees. Now, investigator Scoggins testified that Tasha told him she had a date with the Mike Moradian the night of June the 27th and was with him from 4:30 or 5:00 p.m. until about 1000 p.m. when she left to go home.
Wait, don’t tell me the reason why she maybe left the kids in the car was over a date. No, that can’t be true. However, after officers asked to search her cell phone, she recalled that later she had gone to the residence of Preston Woods, describing the layout of the interior of Tashid’s vehicle. The police officer said that the back passenger door was obstructed based on the front seat being leaned back very far and two car seats piled up right behind it.
You couldn’t get between the seat and the car seats. It would have been hard to get through there. Melanie Carlile testified that she was employed by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation as a special agent forensic scientist in the field of toxicology and blood alcohol. She said that her testing of Tasha’s blood showed amphetamine at less than.
5 micrograms per millimeter and meth amphetamine at less than.5 micrograms per millimeter. She said that following a meth amphetamine high the user would end up feeling some kind of crash where they would become depressed and sleepy. Monica Dats testified that she was a crime scene investigator and latent print examiner with the Bradley County Sheriff’s Office.
She examined Tasha’s vehicle and described the condition of the doors. She said, “I couldn’t get the door to open myself, but I was able to pull on a mechanism inside there and open the door.” She also confirmed that Tasha’s cell phone was in the trunk of the vehicle. Now, a meteorologist from Saratoga, California, testified that they had been studying the temperatures when they were between 72 and 96°.
He described the effect of the sun’s heating the interior of a vehicle. He said that a car basically acts as a greenhouse and he was trying to give evidence on why or how temperatures in a car can be very different to temperatures outside. He said it’s not uncommon for objects inside a vehicle to reach 200°.
You ever touch the front dash of a car or a seat or even the um the seat belt buckle, the metal bit, it can get very hot, right? He said that the items that become very hot in a car give off heat that warms the air inside of a car. He said that a car is a closed area so that the heat continues to rise and it actually heats up very rapidly.
In the first 10 minutes, a car heats up about 19 degrees above whatever the outside air temperature is. So he said when when you start a car, in the first 10 minutes, a car can heat up 19° more than the outside temperature. Then after 30 minutes, it could be 34°. Then after an hour, the temperature inside the car could be 40° higher than what it is outside.
And when he conducted the experiment on Tasha’s car, he said after about an hour and a half, the temperature plateaued at the outside temperature plus 45° inside the car. He had reviewed the temperature records and the June 28th temperature at the Cleveland water treatment plant was 101° to what 85° temperature during the first hour, it would have gotten to 125 or so.
In other words, 85° plus the 40 and then gradually as the day warmed up from that 85 to 101, the temperature inside the car. Again, that plateau would have been reached and it would have stayed up at that range. So, this meteorologist was able to explain that if you leave someone in the car for an hour during these kind of temperatures, it’s going to get very, very hot. We move on to Dr.
Steven Cogwell. He testified that he was the deputy chief medical examiner at the regional forensic center in Knoxville. He described the effect on the human body as the temperature rises. Well, at 109° the average human will be comeos and probably die, the doctor said. Then he said above a 108 we start seeing brain damage, irreversible brain damage.
Above 104 we start seeing reversible kind of changes, the ones that have already gone over. But when you get to about roughly a 105 or 106 or so, coma starts setting in because you are simply unable to maintain conscientiousness. He’s claiming your brain is not getting enough blood and what blood it is getting isn’t having much oxygen in it.
You are not moving it very well and basically your body begins this process of shutting down which ultimately leads to death. At a 109 degree core temperature though, you would be expected to be in coma if not death by that point. So during the trial, they had these experts in to confirm, look, the temperature in the car was deadly.
Patrick Vastiling of the Department of Children’s Services testified that on June the 28th, 2012, he spoke with Tasha at the Skyidge Hospital that she consented to a urine test and that a 10 panel drug screen over urine was positive for meth and fetamine. Investigator Scoggins testified that during a search of Tasha’s home on July the 13th, 2012, officers found items used to manufacture methampetamine in the garage and in a dumpster near the garage.
Lieutenant John Stone of the Bradley County Sheriff’s Department Narcotics Unit testified that he was familiar with the one pot method for manufacturing methampetamine and that items found in Tash’s home and dumpster were consistent with the production and use of methampetamine. So, are you following the pattern here? up. Up until this point, we’re not sure what’s going on, but we have someone who is a drug user, a strong drug user.
Her kids were not in her presence and then they end up dying. So, what’s going on? Was she being neglectful? Did she do this on purpose or was just random and innocuous? Detective Heath Arthur of the Bradley County Sheriff’s Department testified that he had worked on at least 200 cases involving methamphetamine laboratories.
He claimed that he helped execute the search warrant for Tasha’s home on July the 13th. During the search, officers found plastic shaker bottles. Detective Arthur said that although the fluid in a shaker bottle could eat through the bottle in 2 to 3 weeks, he did not see any signs of bottle deterioration in this case. On cross-examination, Detective Arthur testified that the rate of deterioration depended on the consistency of the contents in the bottle and that he’s no expert on it, but he’s going by what was stated to him from a meth cook that he
recovered from a meth lab. James Michael Derry of the Tennessee Meth and Pharmaceutical Task Force testified that he was certified to operate an iron scan machine and that the machine could detect meth residue on surfaces. He testified as an expert in the operation of the iron scanner that he tested right on the spot as they were collected in Tash’s home.
The iron scanner detected a pretty substantial hit of meth on a swab collected from a piece of aluminium foil in Tasha’s garage. So, the question remains, what actually happened on that day? Tasha testified that on the day of the victim’s death, they were playing outside while she was cleaning inside her home.
She noticed she had not heard from them for a while. She went outside to check on them and found them lying in the yard. Tasha said she kept a marijuana pipe and a meth pipe in the garage, but denied knowledge of materials for making meth or providing a place to cook meth. On cross-examination, Tasha maintained that she found the victims toward the front yard past the slip and slide.
On cross-examination, Tasha claimed that she found her children on the slip and slide and she panicked. She put them in her car and then took them to her father’s house. Prosecutors tried to portray her as a neglectful mother living in a dirty trash home. You see, the prosecutors tried to portray her as a neglectful mother who lived in a dirty home.
But the problem was Tash’s accuracy and her authenticity. She claimed she showed them in the slip and slide. Then she said, “No, they were in the car.” She’s like, “No, they’re at my father’s house.” So, everyone’s trying to understand, okay, what actually happened. One key detail was that when the police investigated the slip and slide, it seemed it had not been used that day, but it appeared that Tasha had tried to spray the boys with water after finding them. She denied spraying them.
Tasha admitted smoking crystal meth on occasion, but she said she did not sew in front of her sons. She also denied that Meth was cooked at the garage portion of the residence where she stayed with the children. She said she loved her sons, though she called them rambunctious and admitted referring to them as the little turds or the little turkeys.
Words of endearment, I would say. She said she did not leave the boys in the car and she did not fall asleep while they were outside. She also denied that she had gone anywhere with the boys on the day of the incident. Now, on June the 28th, 2012, the next door neighbor said she was driving by at 11:00 a.m. and saw the family vehicle pulling into the trailer and garage on Keith Valley Road.
Tasha said she and the boys had gotten home the previous night around midnight or 1:00 a.m. Preston Woods, who was a friend, told the jury that Tasha was with him till around 1:00 a.m. On the day in question, she said Leland and River got up early and went outside. She said she fixed them scrambled eggs, but she doesn’t remember if they ate them.
She said she was trying to clean the residence that was described as nasty and messy by her aunt. She said she would look out a bedroom window at times to check on the boys. She said she then fixed lunch, but they didn’t come in or did they didn’t want to take a nap. She said the boys just wanted to continue playing outside.
During the trial, she said it was a gorgeous day and I didn’t have a problem with them playing outside. It was testified that it was 101° that day. Tasha said it was hot every day that summer, but me and you can both agree 101° will not result in the outcome on what happened to these two boys. When she was asked, “Why is your house always so dirty?” She said, “Well, it’s hard being a single mother.
” She said she mainly kept busy tending to the sons. She also told Detective Scoggins in a final interview that she had found the children in her car because I just wanted to go home. I felt I wasn’t going to get to go anywhere until I told him what he wanted to hear. In other words, she only told the police officer at the hospital that she found the boys in her car so he could be like, “Okay, he can get what he wants and she can go home.
” In other words, she didn’t mean it. Hasha said on the evening prior to the incident, she went to a church to meet a man she had been flirting with online. She said she sent him a picture of herself that she took in the car while on the way. She said she spent about 2 hours with Mike Meridian at the location and that her last job was with a cleaning company, but it only lasted a couple of weeks because it was such hard work.
She also worked for about 5 years at Petco grooming animals. Pasha said during the trial that she did smoke marijuana and maybe once a month used meth. So regarding the trial itself, eventually on August the 29th, 2013, a Bradley County criminal court jury convicted Tasha. They charged her of two counts of firstdegree felony murder and two counts of aggravated child neglect.
The jury convicted Tasha of four counts of facilitation to initiate the process to manufacture meth as a lesser included offense of initiating the process to manufacture meth. After a sentencing hearing, the trial court sentenced Tasha to consecutive life sentences for the felony murder convictions.
The court sentenced her to 20 years for each conviction of aggravated child neglect and ordered that she serve the sentences consecutively to each other but concurrently with the life sentences. So here’s my conclusion on this case. I can’t remember the guy’s name. I did a case on him previously. The image is on the screen.
He was found guilty in the death of his child. He left his child in his car, went to work, came back, realized his child was still in the car. The child died of hypothermia. This is a very similar case. Children died of hypothermia in a situation where hypothermia otherwise wouldn’t happen. You know, children playing outside. So, the theory was that either she left them in the car or maybe when they came home the night before, you know, she must have been she must have had drugs in her system.
Maybe she wasn’t fully aware of her surroundings. Maybe she left the children in her car. That’s the neglect to which they’re referring to. She forgot whatever it is. She left them in the car and then oops, you know, she wakes up. Oh no, where are my children? And then she sees them in the car. Now, let’s assume let’s assume this was just a mistake. She completely forgot.
I mean, how you can forget? I don’t know. But let’s just say this was a complete accident. Well, it doesn’t matter cuz it’s her job to know. simple. As a parent, it’s your job to know. That’s why you’re the parent. The fact that she had like a drug lab, meth lab, whatever you want to call it, in her residences and her house was dirty, I mean, it’s just such a sad outcome for these two children who never once asked for this kind of mother. Comment.
Tell me what you
