Category: Metro

SAN ANTONIO (TCD) — A couple faces multiple felony charges after allegedly injecting their baby with meth to treat her burn injuries last week.

According to Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar, on Friday, Nov. 3, a baby girl just over a year old sustained severe liquid burn injuries to her face, as well as her upper and lower body. Instead of seeking medical care, Salazar said the baby’s mother, 31-year-old Amanda Mann, called her partner, Dustin Lawrence, and asked him to bring home burn ointment.

Salazar alleges that Mann and Lawrence treated the baby with ointment and then injected her with meth to help her with the pain. The baby reportedly slept through the night. When she woke up, her parents pulled away the sheets, and parts of her skin allegedly peeled off.

According to Salazar, investigators believe the parents knew they would be in trouble, so they tried to keep the situation quiet as the baby continued to experience physical problems.

The infant reportedly struggled to breathe, so the parents used a bulb to extract mucus and attempted chest compressions. Salazar said the parents eventually called a family friend, who suggested they take the baby to the hospital, which they did on the night of Saturday, Nov. 4.

According to the Bexar Sheriff’s Office, Mann admitted the baby into the hospital, but she did not return. Salazar said officials eventually found her “milling around the parking lot” of the medical center.

Further investigation revealed the baby sustained the burns from boiling water on the stove, Salazar said. Officials do not know if the water spill was intentional or accidental.

The couple faces multiple felony charges. Salazar said in a statement, “Based on the level of outright torture this baby had to endure, I wish there was something else we could charge them with.”

As of Nov. 6, the baby is alive, and Salazar said he hopes the baby makes a full recovery. If that is not the case, the parents’ charges will be upgraded.

The sheriff added that the baby girl was failing to thrive at only 18 pounds and 24 inches at the hospital.

According to Salazar, the couple lived in a “filthy” RV with five other children, including a 6-year-old boy who reportedly tested positive for meth as well. The sheriff called it an “ugly, horrible” case.

Child Protective Services took custody of the children.

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BRADLEYVILLE, Mo. (TCD) — An 80-year-old man is facing several charges, including second-degree murder, for allegedly fatally shooting his roommate during a dispute in which the victim allegedly threatened to kill the suspect.

On Nov. 2 at 7:04 p.m., Taney County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to a call about a male with a gunshot wound in Bradleyville and called paramedics asking for assistance to airlift the man to a hospital. When medics arrived, they declared the victim, who was identified as 52-year-old Jon Lovelace, deceased at the scene.

According to the probable cause affidavit, deputies identified Charles Tinker as the suspected shooter and detained him at the scene. Officials reportedly found a 9 mm Ruger handgun nearby.

A witness told deputies they saw Tinker shoot Lovelace in the stomach during an argument. Tinker allegedly corroborated the account because he “made unprovoked statements to law enforcement officers on scene that he shot the victim during a verbal argument.”

Tinker reportedly said Lovelace lived at the residence but failed to pay rent or pitch in for other expenses. He claimed he shot Lovelace because Lovelace “told him he was going to kill him.”

Deputies transported Tinker to a hospital for a brief confinement because he had consumed four shots of whiskey that night.

On Nov. 3, Tinker spoke with a Taney County deputy and allegedly admitted to shooting Lovelace. According to the affidavit, after Lovelace reportedly threatened to kill Tinker, Tinker retrieved a gun, “fired two shots behind a vehicle to make another individual leave from the residence and fired two additional shots at the victim.”

He allegedly claimed he intended to shoot Lovelace in the leg. He opened fire from his porch, then returned inside. The affidavit says Tinker failed to check on Lovelace or render aid.

Tinker allegedly “stated he shot the victim because he had ‘pushed my buttons’ and that’s all he was going to take.”

The tensions between the two men had reportedly been getting worse over time. The affidavit says Lovelace was not armed, nor did he fight Tinker at the time of the shooting. Tinker reportedly claimed he shot his roommate “from a combination of fear of safety and being angry.”

He was booked into the Taney County Jail and is being charged with second-degree murder, armed criminal action, and unlawful use of a weapon.

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COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (TCD) — A man and his wife were arrested in Oklahoma after officials discovered almost 200 decaying body inside a funeral home the couple owned and operated.

On Oct. 3, Fremont County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to Return to Nature Funeral Home located at 31 Werner Road in Penrose regarding a “suspicious incident.” Investigators executed a search warrant the next day and found human remains “improperly stored inside the building.”

According to the 4th Judicial District Attorney’s Office, the investigation began due to reports of “a foul odor coming from the funeral home’s facility.”

In an updated news release, the Fremont County Sheriff’s Office announced officials removed at least 189 bodies from the funeral home and transported them to the El Paso County Coroner’s Office. The statement said the number could change during the investigative process.

Return to Nature Funeral Home owners Jon Hallford and Carie Hallford were located and arrested in Wagoner, Oklahoma, on Wednesday, Nov. 8, on charges of abuse of a corpse, theft, money laundering, and forgery.

In a Nov. 8 press conference, Fremont County Coroner Randy Keller said his office has positively identified 110 victims thus far by using dental records, fingerprints, and medical hardware. Officials will use DNA testing “if necessary.” Twenty-five decedents have been returned to their families. Keller updated the number of victims to 190.

The probable cause affidavit remains sealed, but District Attorney Michael Allen said during the press conference that the “information contained in the affidavit is absolutely shocking.”

The Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies said in a statement that Return to Nature Funeral Home was a licensed funeral home between March 25, 2019, and Nov. 30, 2022. The company was not licensed at the time of the discovery, but the statement said the department “did not receive any official complaints during the period when the facility was licensed.”

There is now a cease-and-desist order against the funeral home because the facility “acted without the required registration to practice and operate as a funeral home.”

According The Associated Press, Jon Hallford spoke with an official from the Office of Funeral Home and Crematory Registration on Oct. 5 about the odor and allegedly claimed he knew there was a “problem” at the funeral home. He also reportedly said he was practiced taxidermy at the location.

Jon and Carie Hallford were reportedly previously evicted from one location in Colorado Springs because they owe $120,000 in rent, The Associated Press reports. They also have not paid thousands of dollars in taxes.

The death certificates provided to families said the victims were cremated at one of two crematoriums in the area, but both locations denied having worked with Return to Nature Funeral Home during the years the Hallfords legally ran their home.

Some relatives told The Associated Press they aren’t sure if the ashes returned to them are actually those of their loved ones. Some didn’t even receive ashes back.

One woman told The Associated Press, “My mom’s last wish was for her remains to be scattered in a place she loved, not rotting away in a building. Any peace that we had, thinking that we honored her wishes, you know, was just completely ripped away from us.”

Crystina Page’s 20-year-old son was killed by law enforcement in 2019, and she brought his urn with her as she advocated for reform on the state and national levels.

She said, “For four years, I’ve marched all over this country with this urn believing it to be my son.” Instead, her son “has been laying there rotting for years.”

She called it the “most horrendous feeling I’ve ever had in my life.”

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LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. (TCD) — Police have arrested a man on suspicion of shooting his ex-girlfriend and her son this week in what officers called a “domestic-related” incident.

According to a news release from the Gwinnett County Police Department, on Tuesday, Nov. 7, shortly before 10:30 p.m., officers responded to a home on Dayspring Trace in reference to a domestic dispute. Police parked their cars a few residences away and heard gunshots coming from the driveway as they approached the home on foot.

Police said they observed a man fleeing the area via car. In the driveway, officers located two shooting victims, a 44-year-old woman and her 20-year-old son. WSB-TV reports that the victims sustained gunshot wounds to the head.

Officers attempted lifesaving measures until the Gwinnett County Fire Department arrived. The victims were transported to local hospitals, where they remain in critical condition.

Police identified Terrance Washington, the female victim’s ex-boyfriend, as the primary suspect. Washington faces two counts of aggravated assault, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and theft by taking. Police arrested Washington several hours after the shooting and booked him into the Houston County Jail. 

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DEARBORN COUNTY, Ind. (TCD) — A father stands accused of shooting his wife seven times in front of their two young children because he believed she had an affair with two different people in their neighborhood.

On Wednesday, Nov. 8, Dearborn County Prosecutor Lynn Deddens announced that her office charged Mohammed Mondal with murder, two counts of neglect of a dependent, and a felony firearm sentencing enhancement in connection with the shooting death of his wife, 40-year-old Stacy Mondal.

According to the probable cause statement, on Monday, Nov. 6, at approximately 11:50 a.m., Mohammed Mondal called his neighbor, Dearborn County Sgt. Kenneth McAllister, and allegedly said he “accidentally shot his wife” in the left arm in self-defense. Mondal reportedly sounded “panicked and upset.”

Mondal drove his wife to the hospital, where law enforcement officials were already waiting. A deputy saw a GMC Yukon XL pull into the parking lot. Deputies reportedly observed Stacy Mondal “slumped” in the passenger seat with blood on her clothing and a small black handgun on the floor near her feet. The deputies carried Stacy Mondal into the hospital, where doctors and nurses administered care in the emergency room. She was pronounced dead at 12:11 p.m.

According to the probable cause statement, the suspect and victim’s two children, ages 14 months and 2 months, were in the vehicle at the time.

Outside the hospital, a deputy spoke with Mohammed Mondal, and he was reportedly “emotional and asked about the condition of his wife.” The probable cause statement alleges that Mohammed Mondal told the deputy he shot his wife in self-defense and that “Stacy was going for his gun.”

Mohammed Mondal reportedly told detectives that he and his wife were on their way to a J.C. Penney store for a photo shoot with their two children. He said there had been “marital problems over the last few years,” and that he believed his wife had an affair with at least two men in their neighborhood. He also believed that one of the men and his father-in-law had been following him.

In the car, Mohammed Mondal and his wife allegedly began arguing and she hit him with her cellphone. The suspect reportedly told detectives that he went to grab his gun and shot his wife. Mohammed Mondal allegedly called 911 but hung up and called McAllister.

According to the probable cause statement, detectives told Mondal that his wife had died in the hospital, and he “stated for the first time that Stacy pointed the gun at him before he shot her.”

Detectives interviewed Mondal again on Tuesday, Nov. 7, and he reportedly said, “I’m not the bad guy,” insisting again that he shot his wife in self-defense. However, according to the probable cause statement, there was no evidence that the victim fired a handgun in the car.

The probable cause statement said an autopsy revealed the victim sustained seven gunshot wounds, and bullets struck her heart, lungs, and liver.

Mohammed Mondal is scheduled to appear in court for a hearing on Thursday, Nov. 9.

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PEARL, Miss. (TCD) — A 21-year-old woman will spend the rest of her life behind bars after multiple witnesses saw her slam her 2-month-old infant onto a road last year, causing fatal blunt force injuries.

According to 20th Circuit Court District Attorney John Bramlett Jr., a judge sentenced Makaylia Jolley to life in prison without parole after she pleaded guilty on Nov. 6 to the capital murder of her daughter, Khalysie Jolley.

On May 12, 2022, the Pearl Police Department responded to several 911 calls reporting that Jolley picked up her 2-month-old daughter by the ankles and slammed her onto a concrete road repeatedly, Bramlett said. He called it a day that “bystanders and others on North Bierdeman Road in Pearl, Mississippi, will never forget.”

Jolley reportedly left the infant on the street and fled into a nearby wooded area, where officials found her and took her into custody.

Khalysie Jolley was transported to Blair E. Batson Children’s Hospital and succumbed to her injuries two days later. According to Bramlett, the child suffered “extensive skull fractures, brain swelling, abrasions, hemorrhages to her eyes, a right elbow fracture, left thumb fracture, and brain bleeding.” Officials ruled Khalysie Jolley’s death a homicide due to blunt force injuries to her head.

After medical treatment and evaluation, Jolley reportedly told Pearl Police that she “hurt her baby, and she didn’t know why she did it, but it was an accident,” Bramlett said. Officials also interviewed several eyewitnesses and some of Makaylia Jolley’s family members.

A Rankin County jury indicted Jolley on a charge of capital murder on Nov. 17, 2022.

According to Bramlett, on May 15, 2023, his office said the state of Mississippi would seek the death penalty against Jolley if the case went to trial. Several months later, on Sept. 13, Jolley underwent a mental evaluation and was deemed competent to stand trial. On Nov. 6, Jolley entered a guilty plea for the abuse and killing of her daughter.

Bramlett said in a statement, “This is an unexplainable and heinous crime against an innocent child.”

He continued, “The very woman who was supposed to love and support Khalysie is the one who chose drugs over her children and caused Khalysie’s death. Makaylia Jolley will die in prison where she belongs for committing these crimes against her daughter.”

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