Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Florida Toddler Murder Case Takes Dark Turn

Episode Date: September 3, 2026

Paisley Brown, 3, died in February 2026 in Marion County, Florida. Prosecutors and detectives said The boyfriend of Paisley's mother, Jeroen Coombs, abused her and beat her to death. Paisley's mom, Jennifer Kendrick, is also charged in her death. Now, a woman who was caring for Paisley's relatives is charged with abusing one of them. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy has the details and talk with Paisley's father in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.Host:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guests: Robert BrownChris KlotzCRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Van DinhGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Paisley, she was a good soul. She was joyful. She's happy to be around. She was always happy. Terrible allegations of abuse involving a child and how it's connected to the murder of a little girl named Paisley Brown. He's not been over his place, my baby, sir, a few years Sunday. I'm going through the sad connection in the case. I'm Ann Janette Levy, and this is crime fix. Paisley Brown was an adorable three-year-old little girl. She lived with her mother and siblings in Marion County, Florida. But Paisley would not live to get to do the things that all little girls should get to do. That's because prosecutors and detectives in Marion County say that the boyfriend of Paisley's mother beat her causing her death in February of 2026.

And now there are more allegations of abuse involving a child victim who is a relative of Paisley. Paisley's biological father, Robert Brown, is going to join me shortly to talk about his daughter and to discuss the new allegations of abuse involving a foster parent. Yes, a foster parent. But first, I need to tell you how we got to this point. Jerome Coombs faces a first-degree murder charge in Paisley's death, and the state attorney is pursuing the death penalty against him. Paisley's mother also faces charges in connection to Paisley's murder.

Jennifer Kendrick is charged. with aggravated manslaughter of a child in Paisley's death and her attorney may pursue an insanity defense. Paisley's siblings who lived with her, their mother and Jerome Coombs, were removed from the home in February and now a woman who was supposed to be caring for Paisley's siblings is in jail. Vanessa Pallickey is accused of beating a child. Paisley's biological father claims the victim in the beating is a relative of Paisley's. Vanessa Pallicki is in the Marion County Jail, facing two felony charges. The first, cruelty toward a child, abuse without great bodily harm, and then abuse of a child without great bodily harm. The children who were in her care have been

removed from her home, although it's not clear who has the children now. The alleged abuse happened on Sunday, August 30th. An arrest report states the eyewitness whose name is redacted, advised she observed the defendant hitting the child victim in the car after he got into trouble at church, Once they returned home, she observed the defendant kicking the child victim. While there, the defendant's daughter stated, Great, my mother is going to jail, that effing slur for a gay man was outside. This was in reference to the child victim being drugged out of the car and into the residence by his hair. After the incident, the eyewitness explained the defendant began coaching the child victim on what to say

and even told him he would go to jail if anyone found out what happened. The plan was to tell people he got injured from playing with a person whose name is redacted. Investigators started looking into the child's injuries after someone at school reported them to the school resource officer. The report states, Deputy Barnes made contact with the child victim and she observed injuries to his face, chest, and back. There were scratch marks on the right side of his face, purple and red bruising on his ear, in his hairline redness on the right side of his face. there was bruising to his back and chest with what appeared to be patechiae. Patikii are pinpoint little dots that can appear on the skin when oxygen is cut off or they can be caused by capillaries being broken. A forensic interview of the alleged victim was then conducted.

The detective wrote, the child victim advised he got into trouble at church, but the defendant did not say or do anything. Once they got home, the child victim, whose name is redacted, and another victim began playing high hide and seek in their bedroom. The child victim advised he was attempting to quote Harry Potter his way through the room by swinging on the bedposts. He grabbed onto the post to swing around it and went the wrong way, resulting in him hitting his head on the post. He then later stated he hit his head and his chin on the headrest. The child victim explained he had blurry vision afterwards and the defendant had come into the room and picked him up. She took him to the living room and put him on the couch. She gave him a cold rag and put cool air on him as he was hot. After resting,

they ate dinner. The child victim stated the eyewitness was at the house when this took place and that she had gone to church with them. When asked why someone would think something else happened, the child victim spontaneously uttered the defendant is a good person and has done nothing wrong. So according to detectives, the child victim did not accuse Vanessa Policki, who was caring for him of abuse, but the detective spoke with an adult who claimed to have witnessed this incident. The detective wrote, the eyewitness advised she went to the defendant's residence after church as she was finishing up her laundry. While there, she observed the defendant hit and kicked the child victim repeatedly. She also provided the same statement about the defendant's daughter,

observing the neighbor outside, possibly seeing the defendant drag the child victim into the residents. The eyewitness advised the incident got so bad that she took her two children with her and locked the three of them in the bathroom as she did not want her children to witness the child victim being beaten. After the incident was over, the defendant kept asking the child victim what they were going to say and tell people due to her injuring her finger from hitting him. So detectives with the Marion County Sheriff's Office went to talk to a neighbor of the family and detectives said that neighbor told them he didn't have any surveillance video that was useful. But he said it was pretty common to hear Vanessa Pollicky arguing and yelling at the children. Then detective said they interviewed

Vanessa Policki. The detective wrote, she advised the child victim got into trouble at church for saying a bad word. Once they were in the car, she began hitting the seat. They then got home and she made him go sit in timeout in his room. After he was finished with timeout, the child victim and another child began playing hide and seek in their room. She heard the child victim cry and went in there and he stated he had hit his head on the bed and observed a red mark on his face. The defendant advised after they were finished playing the eyewitness came over to cook dinner and they ate.

Vanessa Policki then went on to say that on the morning of August 31st, she took the child to the doctor and noticed that he had a marking on his face and she took a picture of it. but she didn't realize how bad the bruising was because she has bad vision. The detective continued in the arrest report. When confronted with her rendering aid to the child victim, she stated that did not happen and the child victim never asked for a cold rag. She also stated the eyewitness was in and out of the house a bunch after I confronted her with the eyewitness specifically being named by the child victim as being there.

She also admitted to grabbing the child victim's arm to bring him inside the house as he was not wanting to go inside when they got home. The detectives wrote about the eyewitness saying that the person had known Vanessa Pollacki for 18 years. The detectives also believe the child victim had been told to lie because the victim had been told he would go to jail if he told anybody about what had happened. So I'd like to bring in Robert Brown. He is the father of Paisley Brown and her siblings.

Robert, thank you so much for joining me. I really appreciate it. You're very welcome, ma'am. I was on me, she had mom. First of all, I want to say how sorry we are for what's happened and what, for Paisley being taken in the way she was, it's horrific. I want you to tell us a little bit about Paisley. Yes, ma'am. Paisley, she was a good soul.

She was joyful. She's happy to be around. She was always happy. You were down. She'd make you smile. It don't matter what it is. She was there. She was always there.

Like, if I was upset, working on the car, she's out there, daddy and give me a rinse. Like, she was beautiful. She was just, she was always happy. And she loved her brothers. She loved her, she loved her siblings very much. She is, you know, we didn't know her. We're just seeing the photos, but she was a beautiful little girl. Tell me about what happened because, you know, you had told me previously that, you know,

you haven't seen Paisley or you hadn't seen Paisley since last year. And you had custody of the children along with their mother, Jennifer Kendrick, who's now in jail facing charges. So what happened? What happened was, me and her mother weren't seen out of eye. And one day, long story short, I come home from work and her and the kids are gone. And I called everywhere looking for, hunting her down. finally someone got the word she got a hold of me that was junior 25 when she left and August of 25

she finally got a hold of me I'd seen them for a weekend and I haven't seen paisley and and I haven't seen I didn't seen I didn't see paisley since then and actually she had my son in December and I seen my son in December but until then I didn't see from August always until February

And then in February, Paisley was murdered. Did you know anything about this Jerome Coombs? No, ma'am. I had no idea who he was. Like I said, she, she had never, she blocked me on everything. I could not find it. I couldn't even look up, look her up on Facebook. I couldn't call her phone.

She even made it to where I couldn't even call her a private number. So it was difficult. And if she heard my voice when I talk on the phone asking, she didn't care. She didn't. All she cared about was her happiness. She didn't care about anything else. It's all she cared about. With her happiness, she didn't care about what this man was doing.

She was worried about if he wasn't be mad at her or not. Like, that's crazy. You should be worried about your kids. Kids come first. And that's what it is. Now we have your children were living in a home with a woman who is now charged with violently physically assaulting and abusing a child who was living in that home, an older child. So my goodness, when you found out that your children were living in this home with a woman

who is accused of this horrific act, what went through your mind? Oh, well, see, I've already, I've had an idea already on this. This has been, shoot, four weeks ago, when it's... I found a bruise on my daughter and the KCI case manager seen it and she took a picture of it. And she knew it and she had another bruise on the other side. And even she noticed the bruise, when I noticed it, I went and pointed at it, she was like, oh, like she looked concerned. And she took her phone out and took a picture. And that was four weeks ago.

That's just emerged. I mean, there's more and more. It's more and more to a story. I mean, we don't got all, you know what I mean? there's more people in the world, but to be doing other stories. But we'd be here all night long. I mean, I got more and more and more and more. I mean, it's, it just gets more.

It's horrible. Your children have been removed from Vanessa Policki. She is now in jail facing these felony charges. So your children are now, I would assume, in foster care, they're not with you. Would you like that to change? Absolutely. I'm ready for my kids to come home. Well, I'm ready. I've been, I mean, today I've spent my day calling them all day long so I can get the drug screen and so I can get this home study and everything's situated. I mean, this home study has been scheduled since June. Since June, this home study has been done. I mean, I got buy extremist. I went to the year. I mean, I got playhouses out here. I got everything set up for my babies. We're ready for him to come home.

So you've been trying to get your children back with you since June. So I've been said, yeah, since June of 2025, but I'm saying since February, I've been sitting there trying to get my kids. You know what I mean? But since June, this home study has been scheduled for the home study. We had to get fingerprints. We had to go through all the process. The fingerprints has been done for two months. Okay?

For the household, who lives with me, everybody had to get fingerprint. That's approved. They're all approved. It's done. The home study was scheduled. They keep your scheduling it, canceling it every second. Now there's a problem. just go home study tomorrow.

They had an emergency hearing yesterday for my kids. And they rung their butt. And they're like, well, cardio light owners requesting that there's a drug screen for Mr. Brown. And one of the ladies that standing up for the department was like, Mr. Brown's been, he's been requesting this stuff since day one. Since day one, he's been requesting drug screen. So he has no problem doing them.

So today I went and did my drug screen. 16 panels. Perfect. Good. home study now is automatically just at court yesterday home study scheduled for tomorrow so what's the hold up there's no hold up they're holding something against me for something that jennifer did i had nothing to do with my daughter's murder well we really hope that everything works out for you and again we're so sorry for what happened with paisley and everything that your children have been

through thank you so much for joining me robert we'll keep an eye on this yes ma'am thank you so much I want to turn now to Chris Klotz. He's a partner at Aylstock, Witten, and Crease, and Overholz, and he was a criminal defense attorney in a past life and now represents survivors of sexual abuse. Thank you so much for coming on, Chris. I appreciate it. Yeah, happy to be here. It's about a tragic case, but it's always good to get information out to people so they can know what to have on their radar and it's a red flag. Yeah, just awful. I mean, let's talk about. these poor children, these poor children are gone, they've gone from an allegedly abusive situation with their mother and her boyfriend into another allegedly abusive situation. So talk to me about, my God, what, what happened here? What fell through the cracks?

Because if DCF is involved with these children and with this family, you have to try to ensure that they are placed with somebody who is going to care for them as a parent would. Yeah. So this is not the first time I've seen this instance in the state of Florida. Unfortunately, the companies that sometimes contract or subcontract with the Florida Department of Children families do not have enough staff or they do not do a good enough job of vetting the potential foster parents that they're putting children with. And this is not the first time that I have seen foster children placed with foster parents and then been abused as bad as or worse than they potentially were in the prior circumstance.

So not a shocker at all to see this happen as an unfortunate thing, but it's just something very much for the public to have on their radar because sometimes foster placements are not good. And it appears from what the sheriff's office is saying in this case that this foster placement was not good. You know, these poor children and especially the victim in this case who the detectives say was beaten. We have a witness who saw this and eyewitness. The child, of course, is denying it, is saying it didn't happen. but the deputy, the doctor saw the bruising and the injuries. Is this something that is common when a child would be in for a forensic interview to deny that the obvious abuse happened? He's saying he like hit his head on a bunk bed playing hide and seek.

Yeah, it's very, very common for children not to be truthful about how they were injured, especially if they're scared of the person who has custody of them. And first, let me start also by acknowledging that there are plenty of really good foster parents out there that are doing an amazing thing by giving a child a safe place to stay. But we need to do better about keeping an eye on, are the foster parents appropriately researched and vetted and monitored? But to answer your question, it's not uncommon at all to see children who have been abused, not tell the truth about it because they're scared or they have been threatened.

And in this particular case, some of the press that I've read about the release of the police report suggests that the child had been told if they revealed the truth about what had happened, the child was going to go to jail. And that's what they were told according to some of the police releases that I've seen. Oh, just awful, awful, awful. So what do you do, you know, as a parent to ensure, that, say you're representing a parent, I should say, a biological parent, to ensure that these children are put into a safe place. Robert Brown, the father of Paisley Brown and the father of some of these children, he wants his children back and he's going to court, he says. He says he has a lawyer. He's getting a home study done. So he's fighting to get his children back. How do you ensure that these kids are placed in a safe place because they've gone from allegedly, abusive household number one to allegedly abusive household number two. And now they're on to household

number three. We don't know exactly where they are placed because of privacy laws. But this is, these kids deserve to be in a safe place. How do you ensure that that's going to happen? So really the only thing that you can do is if you're a biological parent and you're trying to, and you're seeking reunification with your child for some reason, the child has been, you know, taken away out of your custody. Keep the visit. that you have, you'll be offered, the parents will be offered some type of visitation, usually through the courts, sometimes with the monitor, but have candid conversations with the children about how they're doing. And so make visitation. If there are friends and family

members that are able to check up on the kids by seeing them at school and just touching base with them and keeping in contact as much as lawfully possible because sometimes courts limit access. That's that's really about the best way that you can keep tabs on how a child and foster care is doing. It's just really, really awful, really sad. You know, this woman is facing these felony counts of child abuse. Is it possible that the investigation continues and more evidence of abuse is found? I mean, these children, we believe, were with this woman for many months. months. And so, you know, this was discovered at school. It appears that the school was the first line of defense here. And these injuries were discovered at school because they were so obvious.

So, I mean, goodness me, is it possible they dig into this a little more? And it's like an onion. You're peeling back the layers. And there's more evidence to stop. Yeah. I had seen, I had seen some interviews also where they had suggested that maybe there was somebody at church that had seen some physical contact. So once a story like this hits the press, hopefully people who have seen other illegal conduct or abusive conduct will come forward and speak with the police or speak with the DCF and bring the evidence forward so justice can be sought on behalf of the children. These children need help.

These children have been, you know, victimized according to law enforcement. and they've been subjected to abuse, not only as having it inflicted upon them, but also witnessing it. So these children need counseling and help. If you're somebody like Robert Brown whose children were in this situation, how do you ensure that those children are getting the help that they need from children's services? Yeah, definitely in all cases, I believe that parents considering therapy for their kids is one of the highest priorities. First of all, besides making sure that the child is safe and in a safe situation, getting them some type of mental health support early is very, very helpful.

It's not uncommon for children who have been abused to wait five, 10 years before they start seeking any type of help. I think it's better to get some type of counseling early on as possible to lay a foundation for that being a safe place to try to resolve some of the trauma that the kids have been through. that that's one of my biggest suggestions in trying to you know heal from from these types of rooms other than cooperating with the state attorney's office and the police who may be pursuing a criminal case on behalf of the child as well it's just really awful chris you know these children have been through hell you know they've just been through absolute hell um we still have Paisley's murder to contend with two. Jerome Coombs is facing a first-degree murder charge. The prosecution is seeking the death penalty and Jennifer Kendrick is facing charges related to

Paisley's death and the abuse of her children. So we have that whole other case to deal with. I mean, what do you advise a survivor in this circumstance to do if you're, you know, advising the foster parent or the biological parent? Just make sure that the child knows that they are cared for and safe and loved. And sometimes that will involve physical medical care. Sometimes that will involve mental health care. Sometimes that will involve just having a parent figure who is interacting with the child in a way that they know that they're safe and that they're going to be protected.

and cared for and loved. Yeah. Just awful, really an awful case. Chris Klotz, thank you so much for your time and your expertise. We really appreciate it. Yeah, thanks for having me. Anytime. Vanessa Policki remains in the Marion County Jail.

She's being held on a $30,000 bond. We'll keep an eye on this case and let you know what happens. That's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Janette Levy. Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.