Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Evil mom watches as her girl near DEATH BY LICE

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Evil mom watches as her girl near DEATH BY LICE · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:05
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. A four year old little girl,
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Speaker 1: the oxygen getting sucked from her body as her mommy
0:21
Speaker 1: stands by and watches. It's not quite what you think.
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Speaker 1: The four year old little talk girl nearly dying from
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Speaker 1: head life. You heard me right. A four year old
0:38
Speaker 1: talk girl nearly dying from headlife. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.
0:57
Speaker 1: A four year old talk girl dying from headlines. How
1:03
Speaker 1: does that happen? Listen? This is a situation. Local health
1:07
Speaker 1: officials say they are shocked by, and they say the
1:09
Speaker 1: situation was one hundred preventable. This is very rare. This
1:14
Speaker 1: is the exception, not the norm. According to court documents,
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Speaker 1: in Scottsburg, Indiana, two children were brought to the hospital
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Speaker 1: with a severe lice infestation. One of the children's infestation
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Speaker 1: was so severe the hospital said the four year old
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Speaker 1: was near death. How can that be? And how could
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Speaker 1: a mother stand by and watch it happen? Again? Thanks
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Speaker 1: for being with us here at Fox Nation in series
1:37
Speaker 1: one eleven with me an all star panel to try
1:41
Speaker 1: and make sense of it. First of all, judge, trial,
1:44
Speaker 1: lawyer or anchor Court TV. Ashley Wilcot at Ashley Wilcot
1:47
Speaker 1: Dot com doctor Sherry Schwartz, forensic psychologists at panther mitigation
1:53
Speaker 1: dot com. Author of criminal Behavior with us, Doctor Bernard Cohen,
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Speaker 1: Professor Pediatrics and Dermatology at Johns Hopkins Children's Center. Author
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Speaker 1: a pediatric dermatology Cheryl McCollum, Director of the Coldcase Research Institute,
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Speaker 1: forensics expert. You can find her at Coldcase Crimes dot org.
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Speaker 1: An Anjanette Levy Emmy nominated reporter and anchor, and you
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Speaker 1: can find her on Twitter at Anjanette five. First to
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Speaker 1: doctor Bernard Cohen, Professor Pediatrics and Dermatology at Johns Hopkins. Doctor,
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Speaker 1: how is it that lice can end up killing you?
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Speaker 1: I mean, to be honest with you, this is a
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Speaker 1: rares hens teeth, To be honest with you. This would
2:44
Speaker 1: if I had a child who team in with an
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Speaker 1: iron level, a red blood cell, you know, a blood
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Speaker 1: level that this low, it would make me think about
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Speaker 1: more than just the headlights issue. It would make me
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Speaker 1: think that there's issues of neglects that I want to
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Speaker 1: know a lot more about this kid's history, the immusations
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Speaker 1: up to date, the child seeing the pediatrician as this
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Speaker 1: kid had normal, normal care at helmet would make me worry.
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Speaker 1: In fact, it's so rare. I looked to see if
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Speaker 1: I could find any data on how much's blood these
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Speaker 1: organisms that take from your scalp, and it turns out
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Speaker 1: that in a normal kid it gets infested with the
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Speaker 1: head lasts that it's like each each byte takes like
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Speaker 1: like one hundredth one hundredth or one ten thousandth of
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Speaker 1: a milli leader of blood, and one milli leaders would
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Speaker 1: be one thirtieth of an ounce. So there were a
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Speaker 1: couple of rare reports of patients presenting and a couple
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Speaker 1: of children presenting with very very very low iron levels
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Speaker 1: and very very low red blood cell levels, and these
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Speaker 1: of organisms in the scalp, which is again incredibly rare.
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Speaker 1: I've never ever seen or heard of anything like this,
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Speaker 1: and even well, you're never going to believe this, doctor Cohen.
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Speaker 1: But in the last six months, I've covered a case
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Speaker 1: where a little girl died from headlines. They had been
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Speaker 1: sucking her blood for so long, and there were so
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Speaker 1: many of them. I mean, for this child, this little
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Speaker 1: four year old taught girl, and a six year old
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Speaker 1: girl to be in such bad shape, how many headlines
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Speaker 1: would there have to have been. It's hard for me
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Speaker 1: to understand it. I can give you a sense of this,
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Speaker 1: But again, in the few rare reports, in most people
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Speaker 1: with headlights there maybe a couple hundred organisms. I mean
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Speaker 1: maybe two hundred organisms. The one case that I'm actually
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Speaker 1: found in the literature had like twenty five hundred, and
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Speaker 1: I don't know how that's something that could have been neglected.
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Speaker 1: So you're talking about not just headlines. You're talking about
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Speaker 1: kids who are neglected overall. So it would make me
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Speaker 1: worry about just everything in the household is to keep
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Speaker 1: getting adequate nutrition, Is everything else being taken care of?
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Speaker 1: And how long has this kid been neglected? And the
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Speaker 1: thing is this is it everybody with that kind of infestation,
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Speaker 1: everybody in the household would be infested. So it makes
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Speaker 1: me worry there's something more going on with his mom
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Speaker 1: in terms of her general care of the kids at
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Speaker 1: home other than just the head life issue and gets
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Speaker 1: secondary infection can cause severe complications too, but doesn't happened quickly.
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Speaker 1: This is different. Doctor Bernarco, along with doctor Sherry Schwartz,
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Speaker 1: asked you Wilcott Shell, McCallum and a Jeanette Levy. I
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Speaker 1: hope you're sitting down, take a. Listen, you were hearing
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Speaker 1: our friend l Smith wha S eleven. Listen. Stephen Harold,
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Speaker 1: an officer with the Scottsburg City Police, worked this case
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Speaker 1: and in the probable cause said, I began receiving information
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Speaker 1: and photographs of the four year old and six year
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Speaker 1: old that showed an infestation of life like nothing I
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Speaker 1: had ever seen before. That four year old girl could
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Speaker 1: no longer walk and needed four blood transfusions. Why the
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Speaker 1: child's hemoglobin levels were one point seven rather than the
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Speaker 1: normal twelve? Okay, what does that mean, doctor Bernard Cohen?
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Speaker 1: At one point seven rather than twelve, and she can
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Speaker 1: no longer walk, needed four blood transfusions. Well, if that
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Speaker 1: happened to you, uh, let's say, if today you were
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Speaker 1: twelve point seven, heman Globin, and tomorrow you are at
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Speaker 1: one point seven, you'd be dead. This is something that
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Speaker 1: could have only happened over a period of many years
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Speaker 1: because because they well she's only four. I know, can
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Speaker 1: I jump in, Nashley, But we're going what else is
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Speaker 1: going on in this family? So I don't want to
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Speaker 1: know you're right. You're right about that, and doctor, and
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Speaker 1: let me tell you, this is like a big family
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Speaker 1: sitting around the separate table arguing, so go a habit aus.
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Speaker 1: Ashley Willcott and Cheryl McCollum will interrupt you. Okay, go ahead,
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Speaker 1: ash all right, thank you, because the doctor's absolutely right
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Speaker 1: and he's been kind. He's saying, I would want to
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Speaker 1: know I'd be concerned about abuse or neglect, specifically neglect.
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Speaker 1: As a judge, I sit on the bench, I hear
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Speaker 1: these cases. I'm a child welfair law specialist, and I
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Speaker 1: say that to tell you this. He's absolutely spot on right.
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Speaker 1: This type of infestation is a result of medical neglect. Period.
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Speaker 1: It's neglect. A parent is not paying attention to nor
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Speaker 1: taking care of their child if it reaches this level
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Speaker 1: of infestation. I mean, you know, Cheryl McCollum, director of
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Speaker 1: the Cold Case Research Institute, I know Doctor Bernard Cohen
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Speaker 1: is saying this is rare. You and I just investigated
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Speaker 1: a case in the last six months of a little
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Speaker 1: girl that died from life's infestation and an as doctor
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Speaker 1: Cohen is saying, total neglect because if you can't see
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Speaker 1: there's something wrong with your child when the hemoglobin is
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Speaker 1: one point seven rather than the normal twelve, as doctor
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Speaker 1: Cohen just said, you'd be dead if that were one
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Speaker 1: of us. How can the mom and where's the dad?
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Speaker 1: I haven't even heard about him, not noticed there's something
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Speaker 1: wrong with the child. I mean, you know what the
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Speaker 1: other day, Cheryl, I was so worried about Lucy. She
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Speaker 1: was sheet white and she had dark circles under her eyes.
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Speaker 1: I immediately, as soon as I could get an appointment,
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Speaker 1: took her to the pediatrician. And she was, believe it
8:20
Speaker 1: or not, borderline anemic. She got in her hat. She
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Speaker 1: wanted to be a vegan. No if it's to vegans.
8:29
Speaker 1: But I was worried about this very same thing. And
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Speaker 1: you know it happened. She was not anemic, but she
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Speaker 1: needed help with her blood, the iron in her blood.
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Speaker 1: What I'm saying is I immediately got worried. How can
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Speaker 1: you not notice your child is it can't walk anymore? Well,
8:49
Speaker 1: there's a reason this mother's been charged with a crime,
8:52
Speaker 1: because she's a straight up criminal. You have a four
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Speaker 1: year old who has this suffering four years at least
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Speaker 1: half of her life. She has slowly being killed by
9:08
Speaker 1: life to the point she can't walk. Yeah, mama needs
9:14
Speaker 1: are being jail. Straight up crime stories with Nancy Grace
9:35
Speaker 1: you know what, Let's just start at the beginning, joining
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Speaker 1: me right now and Jeanette Leavy, Emmy nominated reporter and
9:43
Speaker 1: anchor on Twitter at a Jeanette five. And Jeanette, tell
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Speaker 1: me what happened? What do we know? Well, we know
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Speaker 1: that the little girl there was a four year old girl,
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Speaker 1: the one who nearly died in her six year old sister,
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Speaker 1: and the school had told the they had life. And
10:02
Speaker 1: this was in March, and the mom was told that
10:04
Speaker 1: she needed to take care of us. And the children
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Speaker 1: missed thirty one days of school beginning in March, and
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Speaker 1: the six year old had the lice for three days.
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Speaker 1: The school told the mom in March. She then missed
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Speaker 1: thirty one days of school, according to the court records,
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Speaker 1: and her human globin levels were low, but not as
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Speaker 1: low as her younger sisters. So child's Services took the
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Speaker 1: children away from the mom and gave them Can I
10:32
Speaker 1: circle back on something you just said? You said the
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Speaker 1: school alerted the mother your child has had lice, and
10:40
Speaker 1: then immediately she got taken at school for thirty one days. Well,
10:44
Speaker 1: she missed thirty one days of school, which makes you
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Speaker 1: wonder Usually if kids missed too much school, The school
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Speaker 1: gets involved and calls the police, and you know, there's
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Speaker 1: an investigation. Lone did that happen? Here? We're not one
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Speaker 1: hundred percent sure of that Child's services did get involved.
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Speaker 1: So oh, plays, that's like yelling out the car window
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Speaker 1: on Madison Avenue. You call Defects Department, Family Children's Services.
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Speaker 1: Nothing happens. They probably made a note in a file
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Speaker 1: that they put away in a warehouse. And here this
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Speaker 1: little girl can hardly walk. I see a failure, Assue Willcott.
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Speaker 1: I don't think the school took action with a child
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Speaker 1: missing thirty one days of school and defects that's a joke.
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Speaker 1: Calling child Protective services forget about it. And the unfortunate
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Speaker 1: thing is, you know, often child Protective Services is dealing
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Speaker 1: with a death of a child, and so things like oh,
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Speaker 1: a child has life, they don't pay as much attention to.
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Speaker 1: But thirty one days out of school, that would that
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Speaker 1: would get my attention. I would think the child could
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Speaker 1: be dead. Absolutely, That's what I was going to say.
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Speaker 1: The school issue compounds that, and something should have been
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Speaker 1: done before thirty one day. And let me just add something,
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Speaker 1: a little addendum, as we love to say in the
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Speaker 1: law a caught. Also to speak, CPS is dealing with
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Speaker 1: dead children for a reason because CPS puts abused children
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Speaker 1: back in the home for them to get murdered. That's
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Speaker 1: why CPS is in on it, because it's their fault
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Speaker 1: along with the killer. Here we've got a child at
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Speaker 1: of school thirty one days and nobody notices, nobody lifts
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Speaker 1: a finger. Well, I want you to take a listen
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Speaker 1: to our cut four l Smith of h as eleven.
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Speaker 1: Kathain Webb, an infection and prevention manager for Scott Memorial Hospital, said,
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Speaker 1: this case of lice is uncommon. It's extremely rare to
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Speaker 1: have a case that is that severe. And I think
12:38
Speaker 1: you can see through that case if you are. If
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Speaker 1: it does go on and on, it can lead to that.
12:43
Speaker 1: But that would be, in my opinion, a very heavy
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Speaker 1: infestation that's gone on for a great deal of time.
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Speaker 1: So that tells me even more the mom stood by
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Speaker 1: and watched this happen, as doctor Bernard Cohen told us
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Speaker 1: for a great period of time. To doctor Sherry Schwartz
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Speaker 1: joining us for psychologist, author of Criminal Behavior and Where
13:05
Speaker 1: Law and Psychology intersect, Dodger Schwartz, that takes uh, let
13:10
Speaker 1: me say, a unique type of criminal mind to stand
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Speaker 1: by and watch two little girls suffer too near death. Yeah, absolutely,
13:21
Speaker 1: I'm you know, it's it's really you know, it's really
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Speaker 1: troubling that she is told by the school there's this
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Speaker 1: headlice problem, and it seems that she doesn't do anything
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Speaker 1: to try to solve it, and that makes me wonder
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Speaker 1: what's going on with her. This kind of neglect of
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Speaker 1: children that is seen over and over in the courts.
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Speaker 1: Often the parent than neglectful parent has some sort of
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Speaker 1: major mental illness, possibly clinical depression, major depression, maybe bipolar disorder.
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Speaker 1: But also there could be you know, drug problems that
14:01
Speaker 1: she might have. And if she's an addict, then she's
14:05
Speaker 1: not caring about much of anything. It's hard to imagine
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Speaker 1: that she also didn't have a life's problem. If it
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Speaker 1: was it was it was so prolific in her home
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Speaker 1: and she's around these children, then surely she must also
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Speaker 1: have the problem. I would be very surprised to find
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Speaker 1: that she didn't. I want to follow up on what
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Speaker 1: you're saying, Aryl McCollum. We are hearing renown forensic psychologist
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Speaker 1: doctor Sherry Schwartz speaking about what may or may not
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Speaker 1: be plaguing the mother. Depression, bipolar, possible drugs. We don't
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Speaker 1: know any of that. But my overarching question, charl McCollum,
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Speaker 1: is do I care? Do I care why the mother
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Speaker 1: tortured her children too near death? Do I? I mean,
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Speaker 1: if she has bipolar, I want her to be treated.
14:58
Speaker 1: I don't want her to suffer. If she has a
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Speaker 1: drug problem. I wanted to get well, But I'm focused
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Speaker 1: right now on the little girl that can't walk. Don't
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Speaker 1: come whining to me that you're depressed and that's why
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Speaker 1: you didn't take care of your children and let them
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Speaker 1: come that close to death, to the brink of death.
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Speaker 1: Can I make a comment to here sort of the
15:19
Speaker 1: vicious cycle sort of phenomena. So let's say she gets
15:22
Speaker 1: a headlights infestation, gets a normal headlights infestation, but when
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Speaker 1: she gets this kind of infestation with thousands of organisms,
15:29
Speaker 1: which is incredibly rare, it makes me think that she's
15:32
Speaker 1: becoming chronically ill, malnourished. There's all sorts of other things
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Speaker 1: going on which allows her to get thousands of organisms
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Speaker 1: for a period of years. That is profound And I
15:44
Speaker 1: totally agree this. This mom a long time ago needed
15:47
Speaker 1: to be fully evaluated for all these other issues that
15:50
Speaker 1: may have confounded and created the maltreatment or neglect. Probably think,
15:55
Speaker 1: for the love of Pete, this woman is sorry and
15:59
Speaker 1: good for now. That's all there is to it. And
16:02
Speaker 1: we can sit there and say, oh, she's this, or
16:04
Speaker 1: she's that, or she's this, or she's she's a mama,
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Speaker 1: and by that, she had an obligation legally and morally
16:13
Speaker 1: to take care of those babies. And I guarantee you
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Speaker 1: this six year old sister is going to make an
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Speaker 1: incredible witness because before that four year old rendered able
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Speaker 1: to walk, how many times she hain't it? Think how
16:26
Speaker 1: many times she really catch your breath? She had energy,
16:30
Speaker 1: those organisms subtly oxygen added blood. She couldn't play like
16:35
Speaker 1: a normal four year old. She couldn't eat like a
16:37
Speaker 1: normal four year old. She probably laying around with urgic
16:41
Speaker 1: and pitiful while we sit around talking about she may
16:44
Speaker 1: have been depressed, Mommy may have been depressed. Doctor co
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Speaker 1: When you're preaching to the choir, all right, I don't
16:52
Speaker 1: know if they have that saving saying it, Johns Hopkins,
16:54
Speaker 1: but I'm on board with you. Of course she was
16:56
Speaker 1: neglecting the children. I agree, But right now I'm worried
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Speaker 1: about the thousands of headlines sucking the auxygen out of
17:04
Speaker 1: her blood. And you know that's an easy fix. That's
17:09
Speaker 1: actually an easy fix. To be honest with you, You're right,
17:12
Speaker 1: I know that I get it. But she didn't do it.
17:16
Speaker 1: That's what is so incredibly poignant. It is an easy fix,
17:22
Speaker 1: but instead of fixing it, she let her girls suffer.
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Speaker 1: Take a listen to our friends at crime online dot
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Speaker 1: com our cut eight. After discovering the lece infestations, sings
17:36
Speaker 1: grandmother says she confronted Sing about how the lice infestation
17:39
Speaker 1: had gotten so out of hand, but Sing allegedly replied
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Speaker 1: that she didn't notice that she was just in a fog.
17:45
Speaker 1: Looking for advice. The grandmother took the photos of the
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Speaker 1: infestation to a pharmacist, and the pharmacists recommended getting the
17:50
Speaker 1: children to the hospital. She took the advice. They were
17:53
Speaker 1: admitted in such poor physical condition that child Services contacted
17:57
Speaker 1: local police. The grandmother reportedly told police that the girls
18:00
Speaker 1: also had life last November, but that scene was just
18:03
Speaker 1: too lazy to help comb them out, and it would
18:04
Speaker 1: start all over again. Too lazy to comb them out.
18:23
Speaker 1: Crime stories with Nancy Grace. Okay, but you Enginette Levy,
18:32
Speaker 1: reporter and anchor. So the grandmother steps in and tries
18:37
Speaker 1: to say the girls she knows something horribly wrong. She
18:42
Speaker 1: confronts the mother, and the mother says, oh, I didn't notice.
18:46
Speaker 1: Did I understand that correctly? Yes, you did. And the
18:49
Speaker 1: mother said that she was in a fog. That makes
18:51
Speaker 1: you wonder if she was on drugs or just didn't care.
18:55
Speaker 1: So okay, actually I'm not really wondering. I'm not wondering,
18:59
Speaker 1: and I'll tell you why because I'm more concerned about
19:03
Speaker 1: the children than nearly died at mommy's hands. Now, if
19:07
Speaker 1: it were a case of documented insanity, which is a
19:12
Speaker 1: legal defense under the law, I might perk up and listen.
19:17
Speaker 1: But other than that, to sit by and watch your
19:19
Speaker 1: children as they are dying and you do nothing, I mean,
19:25
Speaker 1: as she will caught in my mind, this is really
19:28
Speaker 1: no different than the House of Horrors out in California,
19:31
Speaker 1: where the Turpin parents wouldn't feed their children and kept
19:33
Speaker 1: them locked and chained to their beds and starved them.
19:36
Speaker 1: They stood by and watched them starve. Here she's watching
19:41
Speaker 1: her children die and didn't notice. Right now, there are
19:44
Speaker 1: obviously other issues, other concerns, other things, because there's no way,
19:50
Speaker 1: there's no way a person wouldn't notice and they are
19:52
Speaker 1: watching them die because this level of infestation, Okay, nice
19:57
Speaker 1: life knits or eggs. You may not be able to see.
20:00
Speaker 1: You may not notice unless you're specifically looking. This level
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Speaker 1: of infestation. Anybody can see when I see anybody. You
20:07
Speaker 1: could walk the child through a grocery store and one
20:09
Speaker 1: of us would say, oh my gosh, look at their head.
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Speaker 1: They need medical care. This mother wasn't paying attention. Guys,
20:17
Speaker 1: we are talking about a four year old and a
20:19
Speaker 1: six year old little girl, two of them sisters, that
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Speaker 1: nearly die as mommy sits by twirling her thumbs. I
20:29
Speaker 1: believe it or not, life infestation and as our friend
20:34
Speaker 1: doctor Bernard Cohen fron Johns Hopkins says, it was probably
20:39
Speaker 1: hand in hand with so many other types of neglect.
20:44
Speaker 1: But this is what we know. The hemoglobin account was
20:49
Speaker 1: low enough to kill someone and a little four year
20:52
Speaker 1: old couldn't even stand up. Where were the social workers?
20:56
Speaker 1: Where were the school? Nobody knows, but take a listen
21:00
Speaker 1: to our friends at crime Online. The pharmacist's advice likely
21:05
Speaker 1: saved the four year old's life. Doctors described the girl's
21:07
Speaker 1: condition as a near fatality because she had lost so
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Speaker 1: much blood. Life's feed on human blood, and if left untreated,
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Speaker 1: an infestation can cause anemia. According to an Affidavid, hospital
21:17
Speaker 1: staff told police they measured the girl's hemoglobin levels when
21:20
Speaker 1: she was admitted. Hemoglobin is a protein in red blood
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Speaker 1: cells that carries oxygen throughout the body and gets rid
21:26
Speaker 1: of carbon dioxide. Typically, hemoglobin levels are around twelve grams
21:29
Speaker 1: per desolator, but hospital staff said the four year old
21:32
Speaker 1: girls levels were the lowest they had ever seen, measuring
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Speaker 1: just one point seven. Court documents showed that the four
21:37
Speaker 1: year old had to have at least four blood transfusions
21:40
Speaker 1: and was so sick she could not walk. The six
21:42
Speaker 1: year old girls hemoglobin levels were eight point seven grams
21:45
Speaker 1: per desolator. Take a list our friend Rick van Hughes
21:47
Speaker 1: at w lk Y He's of arrest of the Scotsburg
21:50
Speaker 1: woman after investigators say a four year old had life
21:53
Speaker 1: so bad she almost died. Cheyenne Singh faces multiple neglect charges.
21:58
Speaker 1: Officials say the girl was take into a hospital last
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Speaker 1: month and nearly died because of the lice it had
22:04
Speaker 1: been feeding on her blood for so long? And what
22:07
Speaker 1: does it look like? If your child has lice, much
22:11
Speaker 1: less enough not lies to kill them, take a listen
22:15
Speaker 1: to our cut sixty American Academy of Dermatology. First see
22:19
Speaker 1: if your child has lice by sitting your child under
22:21
Speaker 1: a bright light. Separate hair into sections, and carefully search
22:25
Speaker 1: each section. Look for eggs called nits that look like
22:29
Speaker 1: tiny seeds attached to the hair. In contrast to dandruff,
22:33
Speaker 1: the nitz cannot be easily removed from the hair. The
22:37
Speaker 1: nitz can be yellow, brown, or tan. If the lice
22:40
Speaker 1: haven't hatched. Live knitz are clear and found within an
22:44
Speaker 1: inch of the scalp. Lice and nits are more commonly
22:48
Speaker 1: found in the hair behind the ears and around the
22:50
Speaker 1: nape of the neck. So to you, doctor Bernard Cohen,
22:53
Speaker 1: have you ever seen a case like this? For the
22:56
Speaker 1: child is near death? Now listen, this is something that
23:00
Speaker 1: did not happen overnight, because if you go from twelve
23:04
Speaker 1: grams to one point one point seven overnight, you're dead.
23:08
Speaker 1: That's what happens when you get your leg cut off
23:11
Speaker 1: and have a giant bleed. You know, she got four transfusions.
23:14
Speaker 1: This is something that happened over probably a period of
23:16
Speaker 1: at least a year or longer. I did several years,
23:19
Speaker 1: and it just and not only that, but again, at
23:23
Speaker 1: this point, she probably had many hundreds or of thousands
23:26
Speaker 1: of life in her scalp. This is the kind of
23:28
Speaker 1: thing where you don't need to magnify her to see this.
23:31
Speaker 1: If you just look at her hair, you probably see
23:33
Speaker 1: these things crawling all over the place. It also makes
23:36
Speaker 1: me wonder a couple of the case reports I found
23:39
Speaker 1: showed evidence not just that headlights, but also body lice,
23:42
Speaker 1: ubig lice. But I mean to be honest with you,
23:45
Speaker 1: this would have been possibly thousands of organisms at this point.
23:50
Speaker 1: And this is something that happened over a very long
23:52
Speaker 1: period of time. This is something that if they were
23:54
Speaker 1: out in public, other family members, friends, neighbors, you're right,
23:59
Speaker 1: in the shopping center, everybody in the in the store
24:03
Speaker 1: would notice this. This is not something difficult to say.
24:06
Speaker 1: So this is something where these kids were probably hidden
24:08
Speaker 1: away from the public. I don't know what their ortal
24:12
Speaker 1: intake was like, we don't know how they were fed,
24:14
Speaker 1: we don't know what this mother did, But this is
24:16
Speaker 1: a lot more than lice. My suspicion is that lice
24:19
Speaker 1: is just one of the many symptoms of what was
24:21
Speaker 1: going on crazy in this household. You know, I'm thinking
24:24
Speaker 1: about what this child went through. Doctor Barnard co and
24:28
Speaker 1: joining us from Johns Hopkins. He is a pediatric dermatologist.
24:35
Speaker 1: He is the author of Pediatric Dermatology. He literally wrote
24:39
Speaker 1: the book, Doctor Barnard Cohen. How would the children have felt?
24:46
Speaker 1: Would they feel any pain? Oh my god? I mean
24:53
Speaker 1: initially these kids would have I mean they would have
24:57
Speaker 1: been itchy, like crazy, They would have been uncomfortable. I
24:59
Speaker 1: can't imagin And then you were able to sleep at night.
25:02
Speaker 1: There's a lot going on here, and I could say
25:05
Speaker 1: you're Pemoglevan doesn't drop from twelve to one point seven
25:08
Speaker 1: overnight without killing you. It's got to be something that
25:12
Speaker 1: happens chronically over a long period of time. So these
25:15
Speaker 1: kids were absolutely miserable for a long period of very
25:19
Speaker 1: long period of time. There's no question as she will caught.
25:23
Speaker 1: Do you ever get totally saturated with crimes on children
25:30
Speaker 1: where each case seemingly is worse than the case before, Yeah,
25:35
Speaker 1: absolutely absolutely, And you think you've seen it all, and
25:38
Speaker 1: you think, oh my gosh, I'm never going to see
25:40
Speaker 1: this again. And it all gets worse and you see more.
25:43
Speaker 1: And this is a case of you never think that
25:45
Speaker 1: somebody's going to neglect something that's so visible to the
25:48
Speaker 1: naked eye, but yet parents do this over and over.
25:52
Speaker 1: This is not the first case. And did you hear
25:54
Speaker 1: our friends at crime online dot Com to Cheryl mccollin
25:57
Speaker 1: directrical case researches, did you say, if it had not
26:01
Speaker 1: been for that pharmacist, this girl would have died right
26:05
Speaker 1: And Nancy, I'll tell you I've been looking at her
26:07
Speaker 1: social media and it looks like her two children had
26:11
Speaker 1: almost crew cuts before. I don't know if this has
26:15
Speaker 1: happened again, but I'm pretty sure said and it happened
26:19
Speaker 1: before and to the point they needed their head shaved.
26:25
Speaker 1: Nancy May I in subject for one second, just to
26:28
Speaker 1: share some context, because Cheryl and doctor Collen are right
26:33
Speaker 1: on the money. It looks like Cheyenne Nichol Singh was
26:38
Speaker 1: charged with a felony neglect of a dependent back in
26:42
Speaker 1: June of twenty nineteen. This is public record, so this
26:46
Speaker 1: has been a chronic, ongoing problem. It doesn't say why.
26:49
Speaker 1: I don't know if this was life, but it also
26:52
Speaker 1: was in a different jurisdiction, So it makes me, from
26:54
Speaker 1: a psychological perspective, wonder. This case is supposed to go
26:57
Speaker 1: to trial in August, so it makes me wonder. So
27:00
Speaker 1: she get up and moved to the neighboring jurisdiction because
27:03
Speaker 1: she knows that she's in trouble. And actually we see that.
27:06
Speaker 1: That call it in practice living Cheryl Or asked she
27:09
Speaker 1: jumping in, Cheryl, Yeah, I was just about to say,
27:13
Speaker 1: we see that a lot with abused children. Go ahead, Cheryl,
27:16
Speaker 1: it's common practice. If the cab counties investigating you moved
27:19
Speaker 1: to Grannette, if Glenette gets a hold of you, moved
27:22
Speaker 1: to Fulton, and they're not gonna hardly be able to
27:25
Speaker 1: keep up and find you. So you just stay ahead
27:28
Speaker 1: of being charged and you are able to maintain because
27:30
Speaker 1: of your children time stories with Nancy Grace. Well, guys,
27:47
Speaker 1: I hate to crash all your theories that mommy has
27:50
Speaker 1: depression and maybe she's on dope and maybe she's bipolar. No,
27:56
Speaker 1: I'm looking at her picture right now. She's a ammer
28:00
Speaker 1: girl on Facebook and Insta. She's got all these pictures
28:06
Speaker 1: totally made up, looking awesome, doing that trout pucker thing
28:13
Speaker 1: with her lips at the camera. Mmm, no, I'm looking
28:19
Speaker 1: right at her. I wonder if she's going to look
28:21
Speaker 1: like that in court, because it's almost time for her
28:23
Speaker 1: first appearance. At the hospital, the girl's levels of iron
28:27
Speaker 1: were so low they declared it a near fatality for
28:32
Speaker 1: blood transfusions for a four year old girl. What does
28:36
Speaker 1: that mean to you, doctor Bernardo, when a blood transfusion
28:40
Speaker 1: four of them? Well, just again, when you have when
28:45
Speaker 1: your blood level was that low, you don't want to
28:48
Speaker 1: give a large quantity of blood to correct it overnight
28:51
Speaker 1: because that could be overwhelming and could cause some complicate,
28:55
Speaker 1: serious complications as well. What you probably would like to
28:58
Speaker 1: do is spread out the transfusions so that the child
29:03
Speaker 1: can accommodate to the volume of blood that they're giving
29:06
Speaker 1: this kid. And again, I mean how much is for
29:09
Speaker 1: blood transfusions versus how much blood is in your body?
29:11
Speaker 1: To start with, Guys, we're talking to doctor Bernarco and
29:14
Speaker 1: joining us from Johns Hopkins Children's Central. Doctor comen how
29:19
Speaker 1: much blood is even in your body? Well, again, I
29:22
Speaker 1: usually figure like, uh, you know, one hundred one hundred,
29:25
Speaker 1: one hundred ccs, which is like three ounces for every
29:29
Speaker 1: can you speak to me and like gallons or cartons
29:33
Speaker 1: of milk or coke bottles. Well, and a kid this
29:36
Speaker 1: age you're you're probably talking about, got the normal weight.
29:40
Speaker 1: It's like about twenty five kilos. You're talking at like
29:44
Speaker 1: two and a half two and a half liters or
29:46
Speaker 1: three leaders, which would be like what like, um, a
29:51
Speaker 1: gallon of milk? Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah a little
29:54
Speaker 1: bit more than that. But the thing is this is okay,
29:55
Speaker 1: a gallon and a half of milk, that's how much
29:58
Speaker 1: blood we have and about a body of say a
30:00
Speaker 1: four year old girl. All right, how much is for
30:04
Speaker 1: blood transfuse? Well, again, what they're not telling you is
30:07
Speaker 1: the quantity that gave you with each blood transfusion, because
30:10
Speaker 1: they probably had to give her a fairly large quantity,
30:14
Speaker 1: but they divided it over a period of time so
30:18
Speaker 1: as not to put her into heart failure. You know,
30:20
Speaker 1: if you if you corrected that overnight, you could cause
30:24
Speaker 1: more trouble then trying to figure out how much I mean,
30:27
Speaker 1: did she look? Does she have to have half her blood?
30:33
Speaker 1: She added? I mean how much? Again? I remember that
30:37
Speaker 1: when you give elect transfusion, you're giving a certain volume, uh,
30:41
Speaker 1: you know, to replace it, and the blood on the
30:44
Speaker 1: transfusion is probably normal concentration, so it's probably going to
30:48
Speaker 1: be like a twelve or thirteen uh Gram's Fermill leaders
30:53
Speaker 1: now say, that's just the kind of talk that I
30:55
Speaker 1: never left before a jury, because nobody knows what you're saying.
30:58
Speaker 1: The bottom line is milk cartons and coke bottles. Please,
31:04
Speaker 1: you probably have to give her. You probably have to
31:07
Speaker 1: give her a homemark milk Carton to replace that. But
31:10
Speaker 1: you can't do it. Thank you, because you can't. And
31:14
Speaker 1: you know another thing that's thrown me off, doctor Bernard Cohen,
31:19
Speaker 1: is I'm looking here at mommy to use Cheryl McCollum.
31:24
Speaker 1: You know how you always see the Kardashians. I happen
31:28
Speaker 1: to see them during my legal research every morning. But
31:32
Speaker 1: they're always taking a there's a picture of them taking
31:36
Speaker 1: a picture of themselves with a cell phone. I'm not
31:40
Speaker 1: knocking them. They're laughing all the way to the bank. Okay.
31:44
Speaker 1: My point is I'm looking at mommy. In this case,
31:47
Speaker 1: that's what she's doing, taking a selfie of herself with
31:51
Speaker 1: some kind of crown on her head. I don't know
31:55
Speaker 1: what that is, but this woman, she's not worried about
32:00
Speaker 1: these two children. Have you seen She's got too many posting,
32:04
Speaker 1: too many selfies to be worried about her children, right, Nancy.
32:09
Speaker 1: It looks like she's had her eyebrows done, her hair's
32:12
Speaker 1: always done, and some of the pictures that she's got,
32:15
Speaker 1: you know, other accessories on his children or the other
32:20
Speaker 1: thing that makes me word what doctor, I'm just gonna
32:23
Speaker 1: say the other thing that makes me worries that since
32:25
Speaker 1: this is a problem that occurred chronically over probably a
32:29
Speaker 1: period of at least a year or two, maybe even longer,
32:32
Speaker 1: it's hard for me to believe that if the mob,
32:35
Speaker 1: if the child of the children were actually seeing the
32:38
Speaker 1: grandparents on a regular basis or other friends on a
32:40
Speaker 1: regular basis, that nobody else would have jumped on us
32:44
Speaker 1: way before that, doctor, they could hardly walk. I don't
32:47
Speaker 1: think they're visiting very many friends and relatives. The grandma
32:51
Speaker 1: did find out about it, and doctor Cohen, remember how
32:55
Speaker 1: you were You said this was very rare. Well, take
32:59
Speaker 1: a listen to our cut nine. This is ashen Web
33:03
Speaker 1: at channel thirteen wmaz dvacs by will show a call
33:06
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen about the home being quote bug infested,
33:09
Speaker 1: excessive cats and hazardous conditions. Our folks came in, they
33:13
Speaker 1: saw that the house was really a wreck, dvax and greed,
33:16
Speaker 1: the house was unsanitary, and Caitlyn was placed outside the
33:19
Speaker 1: home with an ant, but returned six days later. So
33:22
Speaker 1: they responding very quickly to our requests that they made
33:25
Speaker 1: this house a fit place to live. That indicated to
33:29
Speaker 1: us that they were in fact capable of caring for Kaitlyn.
33:33
Speaker 1: He says, there wasn't enough evidence to pull Caitlyn out
33:35
Speaker 1: of the home in two thousand and eight or twenty eighteen.
33:37
Speaker 1: The standard required to remove a child from home is
33:40
Speaker 1: that the child is an imminent dangerous and there's the
33:44
Speaker 1: child's safety. Is it really a threat? Now, that can
33:47
Speaker 1: be emotional safety as well as physical safety. But we
33:51
Speaker 1: also do get involved with cases that maybe are a
33:55
Speaker 1: little less than that, but that where there's a chronic
33:59
Speaker 1: issue where we need the assistance of the courts in
34:02
Speaker 1: making sure the family does what they need to do
34:05
Speaker 1: to remedy the situation. There, you're hearing the speaker address
34:11
Speaker 1: what doctor Cohen is saying. With severe headlines infestation to
34:16
Speaker 1: the point of near death, there are other issues typically
34:19
Speaker 1: in the home issues of neglect and in that case,
34:22
Speaker 1: take a listen to our friends w XIA eleven cut twelve.
34:26
Speaker 1: In August, Katie Horton and Joey Yazviiak were both charged
34:29
Speaker 1: with murder and child cruelty in the twelve year old's death.
34:33
Speaker 1: A GBI investigator testified Monday that Caitlin's death likely resulted
34:37
Speaker 1: from a severe lice infestation. Special Agent Ryan Hilton testified
34:42
Speaker 1: that Caitlin's primary cause of death was cardiac arrest, the
34:45
Speaker 1: secondary cause was anemia. He said the girl's life infestation
34:50
Speaker 1: was the worst he'd ever seen and doctors had ever seen,
34:54
Speaker 1: and it may have lasted for years. Hilton said repeated
34:57
Speaker 1: bites lowered her blood iron levels, which likely caused that
35:01
Speaker 1: anemia and may have triggered the heart attack. After hearing
35:04
Speaker 1: the evidence, Judge Brenda Trammell ruled there was enough evidence
35:08
Speaker 1: to charge both parents that little girl dies because of
35:13
Speaker 1: life's infestation after living years of misery, because mommy and
35:20
Speaker 1: daddy do nothing to you. And Jeanette Levy, Emmy Nominated
35:27
Speaker 1: Reporter and anchor, where is mommy now? And hey, it's
35:31
Speaker 1: not all her. I haven't heard a word about daddy.
35:33
Speaker 1: Where is he We don't know anything about the dad.
35:38
Speaker 1: The mom is facing the charges, but we haven't really
35:41
Speaker 1: heard anything about dad, and there's nothing showing dad on
35:45
Speaker 1: the Instagram or the Facebook that I can see, and
35:47
Speaker 1: I'm wondering how much time she can face. Typically with
35:50
Speaker 1: a case like this, it's a revolving door, as she
35:53
Speaker 1: will cut. Oh, of course, absolutely, it is so the
35:56
Speaker 1: thing that happens in cases like this. It's a little
35:58
Speaker 1: bit different when it gets this the beer, but it's
36:01
Speaker 1: true when they first investigate, the goal is always by
36:04
Speaker 1: the bed's reunification. The child may get treated and then
36:07
Speaker 1: the child goes home. Nancy, that's the reality of what
36:10
Speaker 1: happens back in the home. Sad to say, I do
36:16
Speaker 1: know that the mom is still in custody and straight
36:19
Speaker 1: out to you got to Sherry Schwartz. Based on what
36:22
Speaker 1: I'm seeing and this is just on the outside looking
36:24
Speaker 1: in and all of her postings of herself, it doesn't
36:29
Speaker 1: look like mommy's at all concerned about the children. What
36:33
Speaker 1: frame of mind, what mindset is that? Well, one of
36:37
Speaker 1: the things that you know, in considering that and looking
36:41
Speaker 1: at her social media and you know, all of those postings,
36:45
Speaker 1: is you know, you think about self centered possibly rising
36:49
Speaker 1: to the level of narcissism. But the one problem with that,
36:54
Speaker 1: and it doesn't mean it's not true, but the one
36:57
Speaker 1: question mark in my mind is a narcissist generally will
37:03
Speaker 1: want their children to look a certain way too right,
37:06
Speaker 1: because they you know, they want to trot them out
37:08
Speaker 1: for social media. But maybe in this case, because she's
37:11
Speaker 1: not doing that, that she's only putting herself out there.
37:16
Speaker 1: It could be where she just wants to pretend she
37:19
Speaker 1: doesn't have children, and you know, it doesn't take a
37:22
Speaker 1: really big leap to then completely neglect those children. There
37:25
Speaker 1: are a few photos where she has them kind of
37:28
Speaker 1: like on parade, using them as props. We wait as
37:33
Speaker 1: justice unfalls and mommy goes before a judge. I'm still
37:37
Speaker 1: looking for Daddy. Nancy Grace Crime Story, signing off goodbye friend,