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Nancy Grace
Young Mother Kills Baby for Interrupting FaceBook Game
Aired February 02, 2011 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Breaking news tonight, live, Florida. EMTs rush to Jacksonville suburbs when a frantic young mom calls in hysterical. Her 14-week-old baby stops breathing after the family`s dog knocks little Dylan off the sofa to the hard tile floor. After a team of doctors and nurses desperately try every medical technique known to save Dylan, they fail. Baby Dylan dead.
Bombshell tonight. In a stunning twist, we discover Mommy addicted to FaceBook, specifically the on-line game of Farmville, spending hours on end living in her imaginary world with imaginary friends on an imaginary farm. Did baby Dylan cry out for food, cry out for dry diapers, cry out for Mommy`s love? Police now believe he did, and when he did, he interrupted Mommy on FaceBook. Result? Instead of holding baby Dylan close, she bludgeoned the little baby in the head with, what else, her computer, later blaming everyone from the baby`s father to the grandmother and also, yes, the dog did it. Mommy, you can log back on again now from hell!
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
911 OPERATOR: Fire rescue Cyrus. What is the address?
ALEXANDRA TOBIAS, MOTHER: He`s not breathing!
911 OPERATOR: We`re going to get help on the way, OK?
TOBIAS: Hurry! (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: How old is the person you are calling for?
TOBIAS: He`s my son. He`s 14 weeks old. He`s not breathing!
I had Dylan October 16th, 2009. He was a beautiful baby boy.
911 OPERATOR: You said 15 months?
TOBIAS: No, he`s only 14 weeks. He`s only (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: All right, ma`am. If you can, try and calm down so I can give you instructions to help him, OK?
TOBIAS: He`s trying to breathe! He`s trying!
Dylan was my pride and joy. He meant everything to me.
911 OPERATOR: Is he choking on anything?
TOBIAS: No, he`s just -- I just picked him up from his play (ph) yard. He`s not breathing. He`s got his eyes open. I hear his heartbeat, though. He`s not breathing!
I wish I could just have my son back.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And tonight, live, upscale Tampa suburbs. Police race to an exclusive gated community and a 3,000-plus square-foot home. A beautiful 16-year-old girl sitting at her computer, doing homework in her own bedroom, dead, her little brother 50 feet away, gunned down in the home`s three-car garage, still sitting in the family SUV. Who is the gun-wielding shooter that claims the lives of two innocent teens? It was Mommy, Mommy there by the pool out back wearing her house robe, covered in blood. Why? She says because they talked back.
Breaking tonight. We obtain police files and investigative search warrants that repeal the chilling truth about Mommy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Tampa mom was visibly shaking when police arrested her.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Detectives say Julie Schenecker admitted to shooting her two kids.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shaking and contorted as they escorted her.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Accused of killing her two teenage children.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: New court documents reveal an officer found Calyx deceased in a bed covered with a blanket.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You see her whole body shaking.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: In the garage, her little brother, also covered in a blanket, with trauma to the upper body.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She did it because they were mouthy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She said they were, quote, "mouthy." The kids were mouthy and they had talked back to her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now 50-year-old Julie Schenecker is in a jail cell just like this one.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sixteen-year-old Calyx.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Shot her twice in the head dead.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And 13-year-old Beau.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She shot him in the head twice.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: For being mouthy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She was covered in blood from head to toe.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police say this was premeditated.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She bought that gun.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Days prior.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A .38-caliber pistol that she used.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This vicious, horrible act.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To kill her two children.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By this vicious, horrible woman.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us. Bombshell tonight, live, Florida. EMTs rush to Jacksonville suburbs when a frantic young mom calls in hysterical. Her 14-week-old baby boy stops breathing after the family dog knocks little Dylan off the sofa to the hard tile floor. But in a stunning twist, we discover Mommy addicted to FaceBook, specifically the on-line game Farmville. Instead of holding baby Dylan close when he cried, she bludgeoned the little baby in the head with, what else, her computer.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOBIAS: (INAUDIBLE) he`s gasping for air! I don`t know.
911 OPERATOR: All right. I want you to lay the baby flat on his back.
TOBIAS: He`s on his back.
911 OPERATOR: Remove...
TOBIAS: (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: Listen, ma`am. Remove any pillows that are underneath his head.
TOBIAS: OK. There`s no pillows underneath his head.
911 OPERATOR: OK. I want you to kneel next to him and look in his mouth for any food or vomit.
TOBIAS: He just threw up a second ago. He was just eating his breakfast.
I was having a hard time raising Dylan.
And he just gasped for air. He`s got his mouth open right now. As soon as I do that -- oh! Oh, baby! Come on! Oh, Dylan!
I realize I do deserve consequences, but the death of my son is a life sentence in itself.
911 OPERATOR: And did you feel the air going in and out?
TOBIAS: Yes, I heard it. It`s like I can hear it in his chest. He`s been sick. He`s been really sick, and I was calling his doctor today!
I`m asking for mercy.
911 OPERATOR: Fire rescue Cyrus. What is the address?
TOBIAS: He`s not breathing!
911 OPERATOR: We`re going to get help on the way, OK?
TOBIAS: Hurry! (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: How old is the person you`re calling for?
TOBIAS: He`s my son. He`s 14 weeks old. He`s not breathing!
911 OPERATOR: OK, listen, I`m going to give you instructions to help him, OK? We`re going to get Rescue on the way. You said 15 months?
TOBIAS: No, he`s only 14 weeks! (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: All right, ma`am. If you can, try and calm down so I can give you instructions to help him, OK?
TOBIAS: He`s trying to breathe. He`s trying!
911 OPERATOR: OK. All right. Is he choking on anything?
TOBIAS: No, he just -- I just picked him up from his play yard. He`s not breathing. He`s got his eyes open. I hear his heartbeat, though. He`s not breathing.
911 OPERATOR: All right...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Yes, I wonder how long the 14-week-old baby had been dead when she placed that call. All that acting -- Come on, baby, please try to live. According to police, they believe that that baby, little Dylan, cried out to his mother for food, for milk, for bottle, for a clean diaper, for love. And what did he get? A blow to the head with Mommy`s computer. She blames everybody from the baby`s father to the grandmother to the family bulldog. You know what? I`ve had it with her. Lady, you can log on again in hell as far as I`m concerned!
Straight out to Ellie Jostad, our chief editorial producer. What happened, Ellie? What do we know?
ELLIE JOSTAD, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Well, Nancy, as you explained, Dylan came to the hospital with severe injuries. He was unconscious. His -- he had a bleeding on his brain. The paramedics there didn`t think he was going to live. The mother initially said that she went outside to smoke a cigarette. She came back and the baby was unresponsive. She didn`t know what had happened. But they said over the course of questioning...
GRACE: Wait! Wait! Wait! Wait! Wait! Wait! She first says she barricades the baby with, what, blankets or towels and leaves him on the sofa and he falls off. She goes outside to smoke a cigarette. Right there, that`s child neglect.
JOSTAD: Well...
GRACE: You go outside to smoke a cig while your child is alone on the sofa?
JOSTAD: Right. She`s got various stories, Nancy. Then she later said that she accidentally hit the baby on the changing table but she didn`t think it was serious. She then said that she went to put the baby into his little pack-and-play, those little portable playpens, that she roughly put him in there. Then the story you`re talking about, she says she put him on the couch, barricaded him on there with blankets so he wouldn`t fall out, went out to have a cigarette. When she came back, she says the bulldog had knocked the baby onto the floor and that`s what caused the injury. But finally...
GRACE: I`m sick. Ellie, Ellie, remember when I was pregnant? Remember when Lucy was born at 2 pounds, John David was born at 5 pounds.
JOSTAD: Right.
GRACE: At 14 weeks, they were maybe, maybe this big. Maybe.
JOSTAD: Yes.
GRACE: This is a 14-week old infant.
JOSTAD: That`s right.
GRACE: And I`ve got the autopsy report right here in my hand, Ellie, starting off with acute focal broncopneumonia, both lungs, subarachnoid hemorrhage, visceral congestion, contusions all over the face, bilateral retinal hemorrhages. That is a sign of shaking, where the petechiae in your eye burst from bouncing back and forth against your skull! What do you know about the baby`s condition when it got to the hospital, Ellie?
JOSTAD: Right. Well, the baby was unconscious and unresponsive. They believe that these injuries were so severe that he would not recover from them. That was why homicide was brought in almost right from the beginning. They thought at first that the baby had a broken leg. It later turned out that wasn`t the case, Nancy. But they realized there was also an old head injury. The mother explained that one away by saying that she accidentally hit his head on the crib when he was about 5 weeks old. She says she never told anyone about it, never sought any sort of medical treatment.
GRACE: Ellie, have you seen these letters?
JOSTAD: Yes.
GRACE: Have you seen what she`s been doing behind bars?
We are taking your calls. Out to Beverly in New York. Hi, Beverly. I mean, come on! Beverly in New York, the baby is 14 weeks old and it`s already got old contusions to the head? How many times can you beat a baby in just 14 weeks coming home from the hospital, Beverly?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hello, Nancy. How are you tonight? I don`t understand what`s going on. Are you there?
GRACE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don`t understand what`s going on with all these mothers killing their children, and they`re all claiming they were on FaceBook, playing these games, Farmville...
GRACE: What you are seeing right now, Beverly -- take a look. This is what`s called Farmville, OK? I don`t know anything about it. I`m too busy raising the twins and working two jobs. But apparently, a lot of people have time to go on line for hours and hours and play on this imaginary farm. They even spend real money to get certain kind of seeds for their pretend farm, Beverly.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, my question is, is there any way that they can ban these games if people are this highly addicted to them?
GRACE: How I wish! But you know what we could hope for? To you, Jean Casarez. Instead of banning them, which is never going to work under our Constitution, freedom of speech, a warning might work. A warning might help, anyway, just like you have cigarettes and booze.
JEAN CASAREZ, "IN SESSION": How many cases have we had recently, Nancy, about FaceBook and games? We had one last week. But listen to this. Let`s look at the facts. On FaceBook, a week before this happened, she joined an advocacy group of preventing shaken baby syndrome.
GRACE: Everybody, we have obtained for you the full 911 call. How long had this baby been lying there dead? I don`t know when she made this call, but take a listen to Alexandra Tobias, this gorgeous 22-year-old mom, the baby just 14 weeks old. She tried every story in the book, but according to letters from behind bars, she murdered her baby. Take a listen to this.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
911 OPERATOR: Fire rescue Cyrus. What is the address?
TOBIAS: He`s not breathing!
911 OPERATOR: Listen, we`re going to get help on the way, OK?
TOBIAS: Hurry! (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: How old is the person you`re calling for?
TOBIAS: He`s my son. He`s 14 weeks old. He`s not breathing!
911 OPERATOR: OK. Listen. I`m going to give you instructions to help him, OK? And we`re going to get Rescue on the way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
911 OPERATOR: You said 15 months?
TOBIAS: No, he`s only 14 weeks! (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: All right, ma`am. If you can, try and calm down so I can give you instructions to help him, OK?
TOBIAS: He`s trying to breathe! He`s trying!
911 OPERATOR: OK. All right. Listen. Is he choking on anything?
TOBIAS: No, he just -- I just picked him up from his play yard. He`s not breathing. He`s got his eyes open. I hear his heartbeat, though. He`s not breathing.
911 OPERATOR: All right. Is he choking on anything?
TOBIAS: No. He`s got nothing in his mouth. He just threw up.
911 OPERATOR: He`s awake?
TOBIAS: His eyes are open, but he`s not focusing, but I can feel his heartbeat.
I had Dylan October 16th, 2009. He was a beautiful baby boy. But when Dylan was 3 weeks old, he had to have surgery for pyloric stenosis. It`s when the muscle in the intestine tract is too big. Dylan was my pride and joy. He meant everything to me.
911 OPERATOR: OK. I want you to place two fingers on the breastbone.
TOBIAS: Where`s that?
911 OPERATOR: Right in the center of his chest, right between his nipples.
TOBIAS: OK. OK. I can`t see his nipples. He`s got his shirt on.
911 OPERATOR: You want to press down about one inch, with only your fingers touching his chest. You want to pump the chest hard and fast 30 times.
TOBIAS: Thirty times, OK. I don`t want to hurt him!
911 OPERATOR: All right. Listen. Rescue is going to be on the way, OK?
TOBIAS: (INAUDIBLE) He`s gasping for air! I don`t know!
911 OPERATOR: All right. I want you to lay the baby flat on his back.
TOBIAS: He`s on his back.
911 OPERATOR: Remove...
TOBIAS: (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: Listen, ma`am. Remove any pillows that are underneath his head.
TOBIAS: OK. There`s no pillows underneath his head.
911 OPERATOR: OK, I want you to kneel next to him and look in his mouth for any food or vomit.
TOBIAS: He just threw up a second ago. He was just eating his breakfast.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We are taking your calls live. There you see Mommy in court, Mommy in court after spending hours on line playing on FaceBook. Apparently, according to police, her 14-week-old baby Dylan cries. And when he does, she doesn`t want to be disturbed. She beats the child in the head with her computer.
And while she`s been cooling her jets behind bars, we`ve gotten ahold of jailhouse letters. Take a listen to this. Who is this she`s writing, Ellie Jostad? "Hey, baby. I hope you had a good weekend. Thanks for the compliment and the beautiful Valentine`s picture. To tell you the truth, I`ve had my eye on you since I`ve been here, but too shy to do anything about it. I think you`re sexy as hell and would love it" -- you know, I`m not even going to read the rest. It`s -- it`s XXX-rated. Yes. Uh-uh. No. This is what`s going on behind bars?
JOSTAD: Yes, Nancy. She`s actually writing this letter to another inmate. It`s apparently a guy that she sees on shower day, Tuesdays and Thursdays.
GRACE: She sees him on shower day? "I`m very faithful when it comes to being in a relationship. I`ve never cheated on anyone." Did she leave out the fact that she killed her baby. Who is this guy she`s writing?
JOSTAD: Well, we don`t know the guy`s name. He is a fellow inmate. And apparently, she didn`t see him, didn`t know him until she spotted him once she got to jail.
GRACE: What`s incredible, take a listen to this. Michelle Golland, psychologist, expert, Momlogic.com, joining us out of LA. In one line, she says, "I had a son named Dylan, but he passed away. Oh, I`m a very honest person." She never once mentioned she murdered him!
MICHELLE GOLLAND, PSYCHOLOGIST: Right. No, I mean, Nancy, what she is is an extremely manipulative, self-centered and callous person.
GRACE: Well, take a look at this baby. Take a look.
GOLLAND: Right.
GRACE: Out to you. I want to go to Clark Goldband joining us from the Telestrator. Clark, how can anybody be so obsessed with something called Farmville? What is that?
CLARK GOLDBAND, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Well, Nancy, it`s not just a few people. We`re talking about 60 million. And I can almost guarantee you right now with certainty that some people watching our show right now are playing the game.
It`s a virtual farm, Nancy. And what this means is you plant crops, and they`re -- all crops are timed. So for example, as you can see behind me, we`re planting some crops. If you plant raspberries, for example, those take two hours until they harvest. So in other words, you have to wait two hours and then you can only pick the raspberries two hours later.
So explaining this case, that might be why the mom became so obsessed with FaceBook because if you don`t tend to your crops, by the time they`re supposed to expire, they`ll die and you won`t have any virtual Farmville money.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOBIAS: I just tried to do CPR at home.
911 OPERATOR: OK. Well, I`m going to give you the instructions for that, OK? But we`ve got to clean out his mouth first.
TOBIAS: He doesn`t have anything in his mouth!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
911 OPERATOR: All right. Listen. Rescue is going to be on the way, OK?
TOBIAS: (INAUDIBLE) He`s gasping for air! I don`t know!
911 OPERATOR: All right. I want you to lay the baby flat on his back.
TOBIAS: He`s on his back.
911 OPERATOR: Remove...
TOBIAS: (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: Listen, ma`am. Remove any pillows that are underneath his head.
TOBIAS: OK. There`s no pillows underneath his head.
911 OPERATOR: OK, I want you to kneel next to him and look in his mouth for any food or vomit.
TOBIAS: He just threw up a second ago. He was just eating his breakfast.
911 OPERATOR: OK. Then go back to him and start...
TOBIAS: I got (INAUDIBLE)
911 OPERATOR: Give him the 30 more compressions, OK, with your fingertips. They need to be faster.
TOBIAS: ... 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30.
911 OPERATOR: OK, two more puffs of air. Make them last about one second each.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We are taking your calls live. We are live in Florida tonight. A 22-year-old mom hysterically calls 911, her baby unresponsive, not breathing. She claims the family dog knocked the child off the sofa and it hit the hard tile floor. But according to police, the scenario such more sinister, including Mommy, addicted to FaceBook, when the child cried, instead of loving the child, comforting the 14-week-old infant, she bludgeoned it to death with her computer.
Out to the lines to Sandy in Ohio. Hi, Sandy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. I have to just say one thing. This breaks my heart, this baby killing. What is going on? My son and his wife are going to adoption classes. I want people to know there are loving, caring people ready, willing and able to give these children a loving home. Stop killing them.
GRACE: Sandy, you are so right. And you are really going to be incensed with what I`m about to read. This is what Mommy wrote a few days after landing in jail to a male inmate she met on shower day. You know what? I don`t want to even think about shower day. "Now it`s my turn to be nosy. How old are you? What color are your eyes? What are your tattoos? Do you have any kids? What was your longest relationship? What do you do for fun? How many piercings do you have? What kind of music are you into? What cars do you like? What is your favorite sex position? Do you like to be in control? Are you clean-shaven? I want to know everything about you because I`m very interested."
This is what she`s writing about a few days after landing behind bars. Jean Casarez, help me.
CASAREZ: Well, at the very same time, she`s writing Dylan`s father, asking why she was cut out of the funeral pictures, and she wants him back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: Fire rescue Cyrus. What is the address?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why he`s not breathing?
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: All right. Listen. We`re going to get help on the way, OK?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hurry. He`s only 14 weeks old.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: All right. How old is the person you`re calling for?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He`s my son. He`s 14 weeks old. He`s not breathing.
I had Dylan October 16th, 2009. He was a beautiful baby boy.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: You said 15 months?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, he`s only 14 weeks.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: All right, ma`am. If you can, try and calm down so I can give you instructions to help him. OK?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He`s trying to breathe. He`s trying.
Dylan was my pride and joy. He meant everything to me.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: Is he choking on anything?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, I just picked him up from his play yard. He`s not breathing. He`s got his eyes open. I hear his heartbeat, though.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He`s not breathing.
I wish I could just have my son back.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: Has anything changed with him?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, he`s still got his eyes open, but you can hear -- he`s got like congestion in his throat. I don`t know if he`s got something in there. I can`t see in his throat.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: Is he breathing at all?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, he`s not.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: OK. Continue with the CPR.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 --
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY GRACE, HOST: You were just seeing a shot a gorgeous 22-year-old young mom who called hysterically to 911. EMTs race to her home to find her baby unresponsive, not breathing. She says the family dog knocked him off the sofa on to the hard tile floor.
But police and prosecutors say otherwise. They say she`s addicted to Facebook and became irritated when her 14-week-old baby Dylan needed attention.
We are taking your calls live. But I`m learning she wasn`t just addicted to Farmville on Facebook where you grow your own pretend crops, she was also addicted to Fishville.
What is that, Clark?
CLARK GOLDBAND, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER, COVERING STORY: A close cousin of Farmville. On Fishville you tend to your own virtual aquarium as you can see behind me. You can decide what type of rocks or --
GRACE: OK. Stop. So this lady is playing with a pretend aquarium online while her baby is crying so she hits it in the head with a computer. All right. Go ahead. Intrigue me with Fishville.
GOLDBAND: It`s a virtual aquarium, Nancy. And you --
GRACE: Virtual. You mean pretend.
GOLDBAND: Some people would say pretend. Some would say, yes, virtual. But what you do is you choose the tank you want. You choose the aquarium you want. You buy fish. You grow virtual --
GRACE: Wait. That`s Farmville. Let`s see --
GOLDBAND: This is Farmville, yes.
GRACE: I want to see Fishville.
GOLDBAND: Well, here on Farmville you can see behind me there planting and harvesting asparagus right now. And in Fishville you grow and harvest fish. So you have to make sure you tend to your fish every day, every few hours or they`ll die.
And you see, these games they build up. They do more advanced things the longer you keep the aquarium alive. So you can see how the mom might get frustrated if she`s been doing great on Fishville for two, three weeks. These fish are growing. They are swimming great and healthy, and then if she doesn`t tend to them within a certain amount of time, if she`s distracted by that child, those fish will die.
GRACE: Yes -- no. I really don`t see how she`d be frustrated. I really don`t see how she`d be frustrated about an imaginary fish in and an imaginary fish tank having an imaginary death because she didn`t give it imaginary fish food.
No, I don`t get it.
Unleash the lawyers. Alan Ripka, Alex Sanchez, both defense attorneys, New York, and special guest Richard Mantei, Duval County prosecutor who has handled the case against this young mother.
First of all, out to you, Richard Mantei. Explain to me, how was she addicted to Fishville? I don`t understand. What can you tell me about this woman?
RICHARD MANTEI, DUVALL COUNTY PROSECUTOR; PROSECUTED MOM WHO SHOOK INFANT TO DEATH: Well, she spent a lot of time since she was at home on the computer. The child`s father was at work. They were living with the father`s mother. In other words, the child`s grandmother. And she was also at work. So the defendant here was the only one who didn`t have a job.
She was home with the child by herself. And she also did some other things because one of the first calls she made from the hospital while the doctors were trying to save this child`s life was a call to a neighbor asking him to go into her house and hide her marijuana and her pipe that she had left out earlier that day.
GRACE: Put them up. I want to see him, Richard Mantei. How could you stand to even look at her in court knowing what she did? Did you have children, Mr. Mantei? Do you?
MANTEI: Yes, I do. But the case --
GRACE: Do you remember how tiny they were at 14 weeks? How -- I mean, Lucy fit between my arm and my elbow easily. Both of them did. I could hold them both just like this. At 14 weeks, they are completely helpless. It sounds like every other word that comes out of her mouth is me, me, me, me, me.
MANTEI: That was true then. It carried on, you know, all the way through this case. She was far more concerned about herself, it appeared, than anybody else, despite what she had to say. She constantly, you know, was interested in making sure that she came out of it looking OK.
And even her sister said she`s always been very concerned about what everybody else thinks of her.
GRACE: Well, I hope she`s listening tonight to hear what I think about her.
To the other lawyers. Alan Ripka, Alex Sanchez.
Alan, go ahead, hit me. Give me your best defense that you could give a jury.
ALAN RIPKA, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, Nancy, this is an extremely adolescent girl who was --
GRACE: She`s 22.
RIPKA: Well, you know, some for 22, that makes my point, extremely adolescent who was not ready for motherhood.
GRACE: That doesn`t even make sense.
RIPKA: She was not ready for motherhood. And here we can see especially when she made that call. Clearly on that call she cared about what happened. She made an awful mistake. She has no history of this whatsoever and it would be my job --
GRACE: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a minute, Alan Ripka. The minute you would say that in court, she has no history, Mantei could then bring up the old subarachnoid indications, the fact that there were earlier attacks on the child.
RIPKA: There`s no evidence that she attacked the child earlier. She said that --
GRACE: Yes, there is.
RIPKA: There`s some bruising but that doesn`t mean she did something intentionally to this child. No evidence at all. And the prosecutor wouldn`t get -- would not get away with making that allegation.
GRACE: Well, let`s find out. What were the earlier injuries, Richard Mantei?
MANTEI: Well, on her -- on the child`s face there were some bruises that were clearly older than others. There were some that were very recent. I think what he`s referring to is the -- or what you`re referring to is the original diagnosis was an older blood bleed in the brain.
It turned out that really it was on autopsy was bleeding through multiple levels of the brain. She shook and hit this child with such force that it bled through various levels of the brain. I mean a child`s brain is not like a -- you know, a starfish if you pull a leg off it will grow back. That won`t happen.
This was recent. It was severe. She did have a bit of criminal history. Her and the child`s father had both been arrested a little earlier for beating up each other, for getting in a fight.
As far as her history with the child, you know like I said, by her own admission, what she did was stay home and smoke her weed.
GRACE: To Dr. Leigh Vinocur, University of Maryland School of Medicine, joining us out of Baltimore.
Dr. Vinocur, a lot of people don`t understand shaken baby syndrome. It`s hard to fathom, actually. You got to be able to demonstrate to them. Explain shaken baby syndrome.
DR. LEIGH VINOCUR, M.D., UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: Well, what you`re doing is you`re violently shaking the baby. And what the brain -- the brain of the child inside the skull from the violent movement bangs on to pieces of bone, and you can get retinol hemorrhages which is the back of the eye which is sort of on the brain.
A subdural hematoma, a blood clot. You can get rib fractures sometimes just from squeezing so hard to shake. And a fall from a couch doesn`t produce those severe injuries.
GRACE: No, and you`ve got the evidence, Alex Sanchez, where the eyes -- the eyeballs actually hemorrhage from going back and forth, and back and forth in the child`s head as you shake the child back and forth with such force. So give me your best shot, Sanchez.
ALEX SANCHEZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: You know, the suggestion that -- you know, she killed the kid because she was playing Fishville or this Farmville, you know I think that`s a serious misstatement of what occurred here.
She killed this kid because she`s seriously unstable and she had a traumatic background. What you haven`t mentioned is that she was once raped. She was taking medication at the time of this incident. She --
GRACE: You mean pot?
SANCHEZ: She had suffered from postpartum depression. And there is evidence to that effect. And her mother was suffering from severe psychiatric disorders, bipolar disorder, so she probably inherited some form of disorder.
You know when you add those factors in --
GRACE: OK. Hold on.
SANCHEZ: -- then you realize that she`s unstable. Let`s face it.
GRACE: No. Rupa Mikkilineni, there was no indication that she was unstable. In fact, isn`t it true by her own admission, she finally admitted she became irritated and frustrated when the child cried while she was on Facebook?
RUPA MIKKILINENI, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: That`s right, Nancy. She did admit that she became irritated when she was on Facebook. She did admit this, she confesses.
However, later, we learned that she also talks about her postpartum depression. Her depression that she`d been treated for before her pregnancy. She was on Zoloft, Nancy. Now granted she`d gone off that medication and then taken Xanax illegally. She obtained that medication illegally and had taken it that morning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: All right, ma`am. Help will be there shortly, OK? All right. I`m going to tell you how to give him mouth to mouth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: With the baby`s head slightly tilted back, completely cover the baby`s mouth and nose with your mouth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: With my mouth? OK.
UNIDENTIFIED 911 DISPATCHER: Yes. Blow two puffs of air into his lungs.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Beau`s body found in an SUV in the garage. Calyx in an upstairs bedroom. Tampa police say their own mother, 50-year- old Julie Schenecker, shot and killed them.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Police say they found a note she had detailed how she killed the kids and told police why. She said that they were mouthy to her and that`s why she shot them.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: She has confessed and admitted it to police this entire time that she did it.
MARC KLAAS, PRESIDENT AND FOUNDER, KLAASKIDS FOUNDATION: This mother who purchased a gun, separated her children so she could get surprise on both of them, shot multiple bullets into their heads.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Shooting each with a handgun she had purchased just days before.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Mouthy means you don`t want to deal with it.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: She was tired of it.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We are taking your calls live. This so-called soccer mom goes to get her son at soccer. He ends up shot multiple times in the head. Then, according to police, she calmly goes upstairs, finds her 16-year-old daughter sitting there calmly doing her homework in her bedroom at her computer. Shoots her 16-year-old daughter in the back of the head then again in the face.
Tonight, chilling details we learn about mommy. We get ahold of the police search warrants. And inside investigative files.
To Erica Pitzi from WTSP joining us at that Tampa Memorial. What do we know, Erica?
ERICA PITZI, REPORTER, CNN AFFILIATE WTSP: Well, Nancy, some shocking new details coming out of that search warrant. We`re finding out when Tampa police showed up at the Schenecker home in the Tampa Palms, a very exclusive neighborhood, as you`ve mentioned before. A 3,000-square-foot home.
They found Julie Schenecker unconscious in the pool area with her robe that was white covered in dried blood. They go inside and that`s where they find the bodies of her two children.
And pretty eerie here. Both children shot twice in the head and apparently, they say, Julie Schenecker laid blankets over their bodies.
GRACE: So she covered up their faces after she murdered them?
PITZI: Yes. And as you had mentioned before, Calyx Schenecker, the 16-year-old, was doing homework at her desk. Apparently police say she actually shot her daughter twice in the head then moved her body to the bed and then covered her with a blanket.
GRACE: What did we learn about the time she planned this incident? The time she planned to kill her children? Didn`t at least three days pass, and why?
PITZI: Police say that she told them she had planned to kill her children the weekend prior, but she had just gotten that gun. She had just bought that brand new .38 caliber revolver. And I guess the background check hadn`t gone through, so she waited until last Thursday, police say, when she killed both of her kids.
GRACE: To Detective Lieutenant Steve Rogers, Nutley, New Jersey Police Department, former FBI.
Detective, that`s routine in many jurisdictions. You have to wait X numbers of hours or days before you can get the gun, use the gun, have the license to the gun. Correct?
DET. LT. STEVE ROGERS, NUTLEY, NEW JERSEY, POLICE DEPARTMENT: That is correct, Nancy. And unfortunately if there`s no history of any mental illness or criminal activity in the past, they`re going to get that gun. Obviously in this case, there wasn`t any background as far as the police know. She got that gun and she killed those kids.
GRACE: Jean Casarez, what more can you tell me?
JEAN CASAREZ, LEGAL CORRESPONDENT, "IN SESSION": She fired five shots. Initially in the car she fired the first shot through the windshield. So Nancy, her little son saw what was coming and then two shots in his head. When she then went back home and went upstairs, the first shot was to the back of the head of the daughter and the second shot was to her face. That daughter was later found in her bed with the blanket over it.
GRACE: And what does that indicate, Jean Casarez?
CASAREZ: It indicates that she moved the body herself after she shot her daughter dead, which then corroborates she`s in her house robe that`s covered with blood when she`s found.
GRACE: OK. Explain to me again what you said about the 13-year-old seeing what was coming. Seeing his mommy coming toward him with a weapon.
CASAREZ: The first shot, according to the affidavit, says it went through the windshield. So if that`s the first shot, that little boy saw it. He felt it and then the second and third shots were into his head.
GRACE: We are taking your calls out to Tamara in Texas. Hello, dear.
TAMARA, CALLER FROM TEXAS: Hi, Nancy. First I want to say how fortunate we are to have someone like you and your twins are adorable.
GRACE: Thank you.
TAMARA: But my question is, where did she shoot this child that nobody heard the gunshots?
GRACE: Excellent question. Out to Matt McClain with WFLA 970AM joining us out of Tampa.
How come nobody heard the shots, Matt?
MATT MCCLAIN, NEWS ANCHOR, WFLA 970AM: It`s a very good question, Nancy, and I`ve got to tell you police have not actually been forthcoming with that information. Obviously, still part of their particular investigation. And it`s still ongoing.
And you know, I mentioned on your program just a couple of nights ago, whenever we were right here 48 hours ago, I said, you know, the father issued a statement. And he never mentioned his wife. And I found that to be very interesting. Like a red flag that had gone up into my mind in saying something isn`t right here.
And it`s very obvious that he knew or at least was being told that information, one would assume. And it`s no wonder he didn`t mention anything about it. You`ve got situations like this where she had literally went planned, according to her own confession to the police, to kill her children five days prior to when she actually did it on January 22nd, instead of this past Thursday evening.
It`s unconscionable, really, at how all of this has taken place.
GRACE: Out to the lines. Caroline in Canada. Hi, Caroline.
CAROLINE, CALLER FROM CANADA: Hi, Nancy. Thank you so much for taking my call. I am going to go back to a comment that was made a couple of nights ago on this case, and I know that the dad was deployed at the time. But I also heard that he had intervened between the daughter and the mother previously.
They were a military family, so if there were problems with counseling or it was required, I know that would have been covered. And didn`t anybody -- she must have been talking to somebody. Somebody must have seen this coming.
I mean, I saw the arrest pictures. This woman -- I`m just blown away. Did nobody see it coming?
GRACE: To Erica Pitzi, we know she beat her 16-year-old girl in the face. The girl came out of the grocery store with a bag, and she snatched the bag to look into it, and the girl said, don`t look in there, and the mom beat her until she actually bloodied her face. We know about that. Right? We know they were in counseling.
PITZI: Yes, we -- exactly. In fact, they were in therapy -- that incident you`re talking about, Nancy, happened in November, and they were in therapy up until the end of December. And keep in mind Parker, the father, knew there were issues. And this time he just wasn`t around, deployed overseas.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Tampa police say their own mother, 50-year-old Julie Schenecker, shot and killed them. Beau`s body found in an SUV in the garage, Calyx in an upstairs bedroom.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Police say she shot her 13-year-old son Beau twice as he waited in the front seat of her car to go to soccer practice.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I can`t imagine what would ever drive somebody to do that.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Then she shot her 16-year-old daughter Calyx as she sat at her computer doing homework.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We are taking your calls. Out to Brenda in Ohio. Hi, Brenda.
BRENDA, CALLER FROM OHIO: Hi, Nancy. Love your show, honey.
GRACE: Thank you.
BRENDA: My question is, here in Ohio when she beat that girl in the face until her face bled, why wasn`t there a social worker involved even if she was in counseling?
GRACE: Well, you know what? I believe that there was action taken.
What do we know about that, Erica Pitzi?
PITZI: Well, we know that the Department of Children and Families here in Florida did look into this. They did have a case worker on it and they followed it for two months alongside Tampa Police, but at the end they found that the -- you know child abuse allegation was just not substantiated, so they closed the case.
GRACE: Back to the lines. Lakisha in New York. Hi, Lakisha.
LAKISHA, CALLER FROM INDIANA: Hi. I`m in Indiana, Nancy.
GRACE: Ah. Correction, Lakisha in Indiana. Hi, dear. What` your question?
LAKISHA: I`m happy to get to speak with you again besides your co- worker Jean. And your twins are beautiful.
But this is terrible. You know, it`s stressful being a single parent. Because I`m a single parent. But I don`t know what would push a parent to just go over the edge to kill their children. You know it`s --
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Well, I tell you what, the way it`s shaping up, Lakisha, is that she`s going to blame the husband for being on deployment.
Let`s stop and remember Marine Lance Corporal David Mendez Ruiz, 20, Cleveland, Ohio, killed Iraq. On a second tour, awarded the Purple Heart, Combat Action Ribbon, Defense Service Medal.
Dreamed of being a Marine since he moved to America from Guatemala. Loved Jesus Christ. Basketball. Seventeen nieces and nephews. Leaves behinds parents Maximiliano and Miriam. Eight siblings.
David Mendez Ruiz, American hero.
Thank you to our guests but especially to you for being with us.
And happy 3rd birthday to tiny crime fighter Bryan. He loves gym class and Legos and birthday cake.
Happy birthday, Bryan.
Everyone, the fourth annual Dancing for Joan Benefit, Feb 26, 7:00 p.m., Marietta, Georgia, raising funds to fight lung cancer. To find out more go to dancingforjoan.org.
And tonight please pray for little Jack, 9 years old, battling cancer. To donate go to caringbridge.org/visit/campjack.
Everyone, see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern. And until then, good night, friend.
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