Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Spider-Man, Thor, Ironman creator accused of sex assault & Mom charged in infant girl’s death

Episode Date: January 9, 2018

Nurses caring for superhero creator Stan Lee accuse the 95-year-old Marvel Comics founde of sex assault and harassment. Crime Stories' co-host Alan Duke shares the shocking details of the allegations with Nancy Grace. Psycho analyst, forensics expert Karen Smith, and RadarOnline.com reporter Alexis Tereszcuk join the discussion. Nancy also updates the latest in the death of 2-week-old Caliyah Mcnabb found dead in woods near her Georgia, home. Reporter Leigh Egan reports the infant's mother has now been jailed. Lawyer and child advocate Ashley Willcott joins the panel. The autopsy report for Sherin Mathews concludes the Texas toddler died from “homicidal violence.” Death scene investigator Joseph Scott Morgan, psychologist Caryn Stark, and reporter Paul Chambers discuss the case. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Prime Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM Triumph, Channel 132. Has anybody ever read a Marvel comic book? Marvel includes so many world-famous characters. Spider-Man's the big one. Doctor Strange, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man. Hello. Daredevil, Thor, Black Panther, the X-Man. I mean, it goes on and on and on. All of these are creations of Marvel. And who created Marvel Comics? Stan Lee. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories.

Thank you for being with us. Stan Lee is an American comic book icon, a writer, an editor, a film executive producer, a publisher, was editor-in-chief for decades of Marvel Comics. It's publisher, it's chairman, the works. He is the creator, the manufacturer, or the disseminator of all of those characters that we grew up loving.

Spider-Man, my personal favorite. Hulk, Strange, Iron Man, Daredevil, Thor, Black Panther, X-Men. I mean, it goes on and on. But that's not why Stan Lee is in the headlines now. Joining me out of LA with a bombshell, Alan Duke. Hit me. Well, I've known Stan for several years and people know I know him. And so sometimes when things happen in his world, they reach out to me. And that's what happened. I was recently asked for help by a young lady who was hired by a nursing company to take care of Stan Lee. And it was a rather disturbing text, one that could not be ignored. So I started digging into it. And what I found was there was not just one, but maybe as many as six nurses who are making allegations against Stan Lee. Let's talk about that first text that you said was very disturbing.

What's the content? It's, hi, Alan, maybe you can help me. Stan Lee, and then she named an employee of Stan Lee, tried to rape me. The employee ripped off my shirt and grabbed my breast. He said he would go to he would kill me if i go to police that was the disturbing text we've not substantiated that this actually happened in another communication she indicated that she has actual phone video of some of the some of the things to cooperate this but the bottom line is this unleashed a whole investigation that's going on. And I will

say it is not a police investigation. Okay, well, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. That's a problem right there. Yes. If somebody has been raped or assaulted in some other way, and they haven't gone to police, that's the kiss of death right there. Yes, it's civil. Especially, you know, when you're claiming this about somebody super rich. Alexis Tereshchuk joining me with RadarOnline.com. Alexis, thanks for being with us. What do you know? It wasn't just one woman.

Once this one woman came forward, I believe multiple women, I believe it's six more women have come forward and said that Stanley, who is 95 years old, has tried to... Okay, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Dr. Bethany Marshall, L.A. psychoanalyst. Did you just hear Alexis Tereshchuk say that this man is 95 years old and is... I heard it. I mean, how is that physically possible? Well, it just confirms that... I haven't had enough tea to deal with this right now.

I've got to go get jacked up on a cup of coffee. What now? 95 years old? But Nancy, rape is about power, not about erections. It really is. And it underscores that not only if these allegations are true, not only has Stan Lee been powerful in maybe appropriate areas in many aspects of his life, but now he's been attempting to have power over these poor victims in pathological, maladaptive ways. And I wouldn't be surprised if more women come forward and if we learn that this has been going on for a long, long time. But, you know, sex perpetrators, they perpetrate more frequently as they get older, not less

frequently. The most common group would be men who molest little boys. I think on average, there's something shocking like 544 acts against 187 victims over the course of their lifetime. I remember reading that stat once, and I've never been able to get rid of that stat out of my mind because it makes me realize with these power crimes that the person who commits them commits them quite frequently. To Alexis Tereschuk, RadarOnline.com investigative reporter, journalist.

Alexis, how did he get access to all of these nurses? And these are bona fide nurses. So as I said, he is 95 years old. So he has had caregivers around him for the last year or so. His wife passed away. He's needed some care. He obviously is still very mentally there. He has been working nonstop his whole life. The movie Black Panther is coming out this year, a lot going on for him, but he has had nurses around him. We call them caregivers in my house for my father-in-law. So, but you could call them, so he's had these nurses in there taking care of him. So are these the nurses? And they're women that are employed by him. He has hired in there taking care of him. So are these the nurses? And they're women that are employed by him.

He has hired them to take care of him. Oh, I thought they were there to take care of his wife, Alexis. Nancy, they were hired actually pretty much the day his wife died back in July. This is what's interesting to me is the nursing service was brought in because people were afraid of how he was going to be doing in the wake of his wife, who was also 95, when she died of cancer in July. So they were brought in after she passes away. Okay. Yes. Alan, how many women are we talking about? I have documentation of as many as six. And as Alexis said, or I think it was dr bethany suggested more could come forward but these

were women that were giving 24 hour around the clock care and in one of the communications with one of the nurses she writes that that f as this incident happened this attempted alleged attempted rape happened that stan thought it was funny that he was laughing. And I can tell you from sources who know him, he's not taking, even though he knows that the allegations are being made public, he's not taking it seriously. Because keep in mind, and Dr. Bethany, you can talk to this. This is a 95-year-old man who's rich as you can imagine. I mean, his movies have sold more than $20 billion in tickets. So he doesn't have a care in the world.

His wife died. And frankly, he's not taking this. I mean, his lawyers are, but he doesn't seem extremely concerned about what's going on. To Karen Smith, joining me, forensic expert. Karen, first of all, Alan, am I correct? None of the women went to the police. None of the women have gone to the police. In two instances, one of the women said that she was threatened by this employee if she went to the police that she would be harmed. And that is why she is being very careful. But it's out now and there's going to be a lot of discussion about it,

so maybe they'll feel more comfortable in going to the police. Are they all U.S. citizens? The ones that I've talked to, I certainly believe that they are. This was not your run-of-the-mill nursing company. This was like Serve Bel Air, Beverly Hills, and that area. This is the nursing service to the rich and famous, if you will. I don't give a flying fig where it was. If they are U.S. citizens, then they most likely know about our jurisprudence system and how to call 911 and what to do. And what concerns me, Karen Smith, the reason I may sound irritated right now

is that by not going to police, there's not going to be any forensic evidence. If these allegations are true, if they're true, this guy could very easily walk scot-free because they did not come forward. What does that mean to me as a victim's rights advocate? That means there may very well be more victims because he hasn't been stopped. I know the drama and the trauma of coming forward. I understand. Believe me. But by not coming forward, you make it possible for there to be other victims. Karen, why is this so devastating to the case? Because of time. We're dealing with time frames here now.

I have no idea if any of these victims saved their clothing or saved any evidence that may have... I'm pretty sure that was just Monica Lewinsky. That's actually where my mind went when I thought about it. And you know what? We don't know. They may have, you know, if the one who alleges that he ripped off her clothing and her bra and groped her breasts, what if she still has that bra? There's touch DNA now, Nancy. You're so right about that. Explain why touch DNA would be extremely critical in this case. Touch DNA is skin cells. When we touch objects, our skin cells and sweat are left behind on objects.

And technology has gotten so great now that we can get those skin cells from a perpetrator off of clothing and other items. So if that is a possibility and the DNA analysts can find those skin cells of either one of these men, that spells big trouble, big trouble. What do we know about that, Alan? Are you sure that none of them went forward? None of them have gone to the police. Several of them have gone to lawyers and the lawyers have been exchanging letters with Stan Lee's lawyers. Now it would be the Los Angeles police department for their particular jurisdiction. And I'm not aware of any one who's gone to them at this point. As, as this one nurse told me, she's afraid to, because she says she's been threatened with her life and the person, not Stan Lee, but the person who made the allegation, uh, I do have do have copies of his criminal record, which shows he actually has convictions for violence. What do we know about any response from Lee himself?

His lawyer did send a letter acknowledging, first of all, that there was a series of allegations. And he said they're false and defamatory, and suggested that it was just going to die out. However, I happen to know that that's not going to happen, because we have some very high-profile lawyers in Los Angeles that are now involved in it. So he claims that all of these accusations are false and defamatory. Is that him speaking or his lawyers? That is his lawyer speaking in an email when asked to confirm and comment. I will tell you that I know from sources who are familiar with it, as I said earlier, that Stan Lee himself is not taking this very seriously. He's 95 years old. And I know after his wife,

who was actually someone I knew quite well, Joan Lee, when she passed away from cancer in July, it was devastating. And maybe Dr. Bethany can say what effect when you're 95 years old, you've been with somebody since like 1942, and she's gone from your world. What happens to a 95 year old man who's got his health? Well, it's a very good question. But I don't think becoming a sex predator is one of those. But go ahead. That's just me. Well, I would agree. I think he just had more access. Now that his wife is not around. I don't doubt that he loved his wife and

was very attached to her, but being a rapist and being in love with your wife are on two separate planes. One has nothing to do with the other when you're a sex predator. And so I think, unfortunately, he may have had access in other ways before she died. maybe when he went to Comic-Con, maybe this so-called bodyguard, now-turned-manager, ex-convict, you know, procured women for him. And so the offending pattern just took a different form. But I want to speak to the fact that he's laughing about these charges, and he thinks it's not a big deal. We have to remember rapist typologies, meaning there are three different types of rapists. And one type of rapist is the man who feels that the victim wants him and imagines that she wanted it all along. And that's a part of how the rape is carried out with this internal dialogue or narrative or justification of, well, she wanted it all along anyway.

So if he falls into that category, I'm not surprised that he's not taking this seriously. Back to Alexis Terezchuk, RadarOnline.com. Did the women quit or did they keep working for him? And what about the nurse agency? Don't they ask, why do you want to leave the job? But yet they keep sending nurse after nurse after nurse. If these allegations are true, Alexis. Yes, if they are true. I can answer that. Nancy, the nursing care service was quit. The woman who owns it left, quit. However, I do have

a text communication from her to someone else, actually one of the victims saying that, one of the alleged victims, saying that every nurse she ever sent over there was assaulted. She says that. Now, but this woman also claims that the owner claims that she was assaulted. What I'm told by people who were there at the time is that it was routine for Stan Lee to walk around his house naked. And he would say things that were inappropriate, like, why don't you come and give me a shower and blah, blah, that kind of thing. And inappropriate things walking around the house naked. I don't know what legal implications there are when you're walking around your own house naked in front of a nurse, though. I guess when you expose yourself to someone in your employee and they're there and you know that they're there, that that would be a crime. So where does it stand

now? Alexis Torres-Chuck reporting with RadarOnline.com. The legal ball has started rolling. These women have hired lawyers and these lawyers have decided to go after Stan Lee 100%. They have started writing letters. They've contacted Stan Lee's attorneys, and they are seeking justice through lawyers. And as we've said, they have not spoken to the police yet. Not to say that they won't in the future, but as of now, it is not a police investigation. It's just lawyers speaking on behalf of the women that claim that they were assaulted. Well, maybe I'm crazy.

That's certainly been alleged in the past, but the first thing I would do is the right thing, and that would be to get my client down to the police station to give a statement, period. Now, that statement is going to be open for the lawyers, the civil lawyers for Lee to get. He'll have their statements. But if this is true, their statements are not going to change. If there's more than one of them, they have strength in numbers. If these allegations are true, there's still time for a police investigation. The statute of limitations is far from over. Let me pause right now and thank

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or just go online with your ipad or iphone nancybeats.com today. Super Beats, thank you. A tiny infant, just two weeks old, goes missing from the family home. What happened? This little baby is absolutely precious, and when I look at her in her little onesie and a little pink hat, it is breaking my heart. First of all, take a listen to the 911 call reporting little Kalia McNabb gone. old and I have a two week old and my two week old is not in her sleep or her passes on the floor. She's not, she's not in her sleep or she's not here. I've looked everywhere. I've looked under clothes and everything. What's your address? 12145 Highway 36 lot 31. Yes. 31. Do you think somebody took her, ma'am?

My two-year-old said she's gone. And I looked everywhere in the house, so I don't know another possibility. What lot number are you at? 31. 31. Okay. And you said you were sleeping, woke up, and she was gone? Yes.

My two-year-old came and woke me up. Okay. That's always going to count. How old is she, ma'am? Two weeks old. Okay. Okay. Who else would have come in your house?

I mean, as far as I know, nobody would have came in my house. My two-year-old says Papa, but I called my dad and I called my grandparents, and they don't have us. Okay. My dad's on the way here now. Okay. All right. How long have you been asleep?

The last time I woke up with her was around, I guess, five, maybe. Okay. So you were asleep since 5 o'clock? I didn't even mean to fall asleep on the couch. I sat down for a minute after dealing with her on the phone. Joining me right now, crime online investigative reporter and journalist Lee Egan. Lee, let's go back to the time the baby went missing. What do we know about the disappearance? The baby's mother, her name is Courtney Dell, she called 911 to report the infant missing. What do we know about the disappearance? The baby's mother, her name is Courtney Bell, she called 911 to report the infant missing. It was around a six-minute call. She said that her two-year-old child told her that the baby was missing, that her blanket was missing with her and nothing else, and she had no clue where the infant could be. They have her grandparents.

Her grandfather lives a couple of houses down from them, and he obviously was close with the children, and she said that he did not have the baby. Her boyfriend, I believe, I don't think it was her husband, her boyfriend did not have the baby. Let's talk about the home. Ashley Wilcott, lawyer and child advocate, joining me. Ashley, long story short, it's a very small home. Let's talk about the possibility of someone entering the home and taking the baby. It's very, very small. And she could literally, she and the father were asleep on the couches when she woke up and the two-year-old came in. And the two-year-old in the room where the two-year-old and baby were sleeping were right next to the couches.

So a very small floor plan of different rooms. Let me understand. Is the baby, the missing baby, Kalia, is the baby in the same room with them in a sleeper? Or in the next room? In the two-year-old's room a sleeper? Or in the two-year-old's room? In the next room with the two-year-old, and the mother and father were sleeping on the couch. You know, Karen Smith joining me, a forensic expert known across the country. Karen, thank you for being with us.

Karen, I would like to say immediately, because you're always looking at, it just feels better when you know someone is, quote, responsible, instead of a mystery that doesn't make sense and you can't fit the puzzle together. That drives me crazy. Karen, the reality is, I remember, and this has happened before, I don't take any sleep sedative, no Claritin, no nothing at night. On Christmas Eve night, I was in, I fell asleep in the room with the twins. I started waking up around four o'clock in the morning because I heard my son, you know, moving around and looking at the clock. I could see what he was

doing. I went back to sleep. I woke up Karen Smith with both of them standing right in front of me in the dark at like six o'clock in the morning. Mom, mom. I mean, they had apparently been trying to wake me up. So it can happen. I was under the influence of nothing but exhaustion, Karen Smith. So it pains me to say it, but I think that it is possible for someone to come in the home and take an infant, if the infant is asleep, without making any sound. Absolutely, Nancy, it is. And I've had cases where that has happened. And I think we've all been in a position where... Back it up, back it up. Karen Smith. Okay, I want to talk about what you just said. You said you've had cases where it happened. Frankly, every time I have investigated a case like that, that's not what happened except for a few rare instances where a stranger did come in the home unheard

and takes a child. And a perfect example is Polly Klass, Mark Klass' daughter. They were having a spend-the-night party for Pete's sake, Karen Smith, with a bunch of little girls there. And someone comes in the home, takes Polly, kidnaps her, molests her, and kills her. It did happen. The mom was home. Nobody heard a thing.

It does happen. But when you say you've experienced that you have seriously tell me about it because i've had very few cases where that really happened yes yes it was a young girl and the uh the perpetrator came in through a window and took the young girl i believe she was six or seven months old, and ended up taking her because I think he was the father and the mother was not giving him any visitation, right? So he came in in the middle of the night unseen. The baby was unharmed. This was not a murder case. But it does happen. I think we've all been in a position where we've just been so exhausted, so tired just from day in and day

out activities that you're sleeping so hard you don't hear a thing, especially if it's a larger house. This was not a large house. This was a very small space. So that does come into play. I mean, really small, really small. You know, to Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst joining me out of L.A. Dr. Bethany, I want to think this through. It's just hard for me to believe that you don't hear a thing. But again, I wasn't even in a different room on Christmas Eve.

I was in the same room with them. I didn't hear a thing. And it's a holiday. So you've probably been up night after night, wrapping packages, making sure it's the perfect occasion for them. Are you serious? We stay awake till midnight watching murder mysteries. Is that wrong?

They're 10 now. They're 10. And they can turn away at the point of impact. No, I mean, never see. Okay, go ahead. Go ahead. Yeah, we're up all night watching murder mysteries. Go ahead.

Okay. Okay, go ahead. Go ahead. Yeah, we're up. All right. Watching murder mysteries. Go ahead. Okay, so so in terms of this little two, two week old who goes missing, one of my thoughts is, were there any non custodial caretakers in the community? In other words, anybody who was preoccupied with that child wanted access to that child, maybe a grandparent who was wanting to adopt, because often when very young children or babies goes missing, well, almost all abductions of children under the age of five are at the hands of non-custodial caretakers. So I would look at that first, that possibility. And then you said it's a very small house, like a little teeny tiny house, and the grandfather lives two doors up. So I'm going to assume that this is a neighborhood where everybody knows each other, kids are sort of playing out and

about. Was there a predator in that neighborhood or a pedophile who was aware of the fact that there's a newborn? I would want to, you know, start closest to the house and look, you know, examine in concentric circles further and further from the house to see if there's somebody who may have been preoccupied with the family. And then the third possibility, Nancy, we've covered these abductions of children so many times on your TV show. The child is almost always found within a mile of the home. So I'm assuming that if there was a murder abduction, that it's not going to be hard to locate the body. Well, you're following along exactly with police thinking.

They immediately looked at the grandfather and other relatives who live extremely nearby. They were ruled out. Those grandparents and relatives get to seekly whenever they want to um she can spend the night there the whole thing no no barriers whatsoever to the grandparents and i remember growing up uh in a tiny house about this size across the street from my grandmother mother and she took care of us during the day lucy while my mom and dad worked so i i get it there was no barrier with the grandparents seeing them they were ruled out very very quickly in the last hours there has been a stunning development in the case to lee Lee Egan, Crime Online reporter, what is the very latest, Lee? Courtney Bell, the mother, was arrested for second-degree murder, second-degree

cruelty to children, and contributing to the depredation of a minor. And the baby's father, Christopher McNabb, was already in jail on first-degree murder charges. So now they are both behind bars for the baby's death. A grand jury indicts the father of baby Kalia. The mother has now been charged with second-degree murder. And it is just as police first suspect, you start at the very center, the center who's closest to the victim, as Dr. Bethany Marshall was pointing out to Ashley Wolcott. It's when I listen to her on the phone, you know, it was just a few days ago that she called in the baby missing. A panicked mom telling 911 about her child disappearing, gone, sounding distressed.

Just two weeks old, baby Kalia vanishes into thin air. From what we know, at the time of that 911 call, when the mom was asking for help, the baby, the newborn baby, was already dead, Ashley Wilcott. Yep, and let me point out one of the statements that she made in that initial 911 call that you've played. She said, I have clothes and totes, but I've looked all in them and she's not here. Now, to me, that's something law enforcement probably noted and said, okay, we need to continue investigating because that's a weird statement. Why would your two week old accidentally or purposely be in clothes and totes? Doesn't make sense. So she did sound panicked, but she's saying some things that don't make sense to me as a mother who cannot locate her two week old infant.

She knew that baby was dead. Well, what hit me at the very beginning, and I'm going to go to the shrink on this. Dr. Bathody, is that wrong to call people a shrink? It's okay. I think that you've put it in our modern day lexicon. So it's there to stay. Okay, last thing I want to do is hurt your feelings. Dr. Bethany Marshall, LA psychoanalyst. When you listen to her on 911, she sounds so calm, extremely calm. And I noticed her hedging about, well well could someone else have taken her and she never came out and said no nothing like that or yes somebody took her um it was very calm very methodical almost as if she was reading a script and believe me or as my dad used to say believe you me that 9-1-1 call is going to be

played over and over in the courtroom every line is going to be dissected and they're going to listen to it over and over because they'll have it in the jury deliberation room if it goes that far far little kalia this newborn baby girl how much would that go for on the black market? What, $60,000, $70,000, maybe $100,000 to a rich family that wanted a baby like Kalia? She'd have a different name, different wardrobe, different circumstances in about 48 hours. She could be across the country. But no, this baby was murdered with blunt force trauma to her tiny head she hadn't even reached six pounds by the time she's a homicide victim dr bethany she was so just cool as a cucumber on 9-1-1 and nancy not only that but she keeps she's so evasive. So I'm listening to this 911 call and a few things jump out at me.

One is, I love your use of the term hedging. She's hedging. She's evasive. There's so many story holes. She does not fill in the picture for the 911 operator as to where the father of the baby is. So it's very, that aspect is vague. And then a third thing stands out. She keeps saying that the two-year-old says the baby is gone.

Now, that to me is significant because not only is she sort of shuffling the blame off onto the two-year-old, but she's treating the two-year-old as if the two-year-old is a caretaker of some sort, as if the two-year-old is older developmentally than she really is. And this is what we see in abusive households, is that the parent blurs the line between what it means to be an adult and what it means to be a child. In other words, they may beat the five-year-old because the five-year-old hasn't ironed all the clothing. See, so they give the child tasks that are developmentally ahead of where the child is. So already she's placing on the shoulders of the two-year-old that the two-year-old has reported that the baby's missing. Now, I do understand that the two-year-old and the baby were sharing a room, but nonetheless, that to me is a very distinctive feature of the 911 call. You know, I'm thinking about the mother

and the father. And of course, the first line of defense is going to be for the mother to blame the father and say she was abused. But according to detectives, this crime was planned, planned in advance. And detectives say they have evidence. It's just beyond me, Dr. Bethany Marshall, how grown people could sit around and discuss how they're going to murder a little baby, how they're going to cover it up. And I mean, the mode of death, you know, medical examiners look for cause of death and manner of death. Manner of death such as was it homicide? Cause of death. In this case, blunt force trauma.

In fact, this little baby, just two weeks old, was, quote, seriously disfigured and damaged beyond repair. In other words, what was done to the child could not be repaired. How can you sit around and talk about that? That's like sitting around having dinner with Satan and Beelzebub, talking about your next antic. I mean, how can you, with a straight face and in good conscience, talk about how you're going to murder a two-week-old baby?

Nancy, they hated this baby. They absolutely hated the baby. And remember, in all the cases we've studied where there's child abuse, often the family will hate one child and love the other. That's always so hard for me to fathom, but somehow the two-year-old lives and the two-week-old dies. I mean, that's so strange. Secondly, she could have gotten an abortion. She could have dropped this baby off at a fire station. She could have given it to the loving grandparents. There's so many options.

She could have adopted the baby out. But they wanted this baby dead. And, you know, the fact is she carried that baby for nine months. I mean, there was this expectation of giving life to the baby and then taking life away. And in the most heinous way, I mean, can you imagine bashing in the skull of your baby? The skull? I mean, the reports were that the skull was disfigured beyond repair. I do not know what that means, but all I can think of is malicious hatred. Joining me is a renowned forensics expert, Karen Smith.

Karen, if the scene is processed correctly, what are we looking for? I'm sure a primary, a secondary, and at least a tertiary crime scene. That's correct, Nancy. You're dealing with, first of all, the home. They're going to go forwards, backwards, every single which way in that home looking for any kind of forensic evidence, whether it, you know, this just makes my blood boil and whether they're looking for blood evidence, any type of abuse, which apparently it sounds like from reports, they have found evidence of abuse. You have the secondary crime scene, which is where the child was located. And then you have all of the evidence with the child at that crime scene. And that evidence, apparently from all

reports, point directly to Christopher McNabb and now to Courtney Bell. It'll be interesting to see what kind of DNA, what kind of other evidence they found with that child. And to think of a two-week-old infant damaged beyond repair, it is so hard to fathom. And I didn't read anywhere where they had found any kind of weapon. So I'm wondering what the instrument was, if they've done a forensic search for that. They brought out dogs, and the dogs were unsuccessful at first in finding the infant, but a secondary search did obviously find her along with all of this evidence. It'll be interesting to see how it plays out. What now, Lee Egan? I don't understand why the mom is charged with second degree and the father is charged with first degree.

Why the difference? According to Courtney's indictment, it says that she too caused blunt force trauma to the baby's head. So, I mean, I would figure she would get first degree as well. They're not really saying yet why he has a more severe charge. We are on the case. Baby Kalia found dead, obviously murdered, and the body hidden in a densely wooded area. We've been waiting for the other shoe to drop, and it has. The mother is now charged with murder, too, as we await for her arraignment and court appearance. We want justice. I want to pause and thank not only our guests for being with us, but most of all for you being with us here on Sirius XM 132, but our partner who makes our program possible. Here's

my question. What will your story be in 2018? The holidays are over and now LegalZoom can help you make this a memorable year before all the distractions take a hold of you. Make this the year you finally get serious about launching and running your own business. Rest easier knowing your family's future is squared away with the right estate plan. LegalZoom's been helping people just like us take care of dreams and responsibilities over 16 years. They are not a law firm, but they have an extensive network of independent lawyers with all the resources to keep you on the right path, including advice all at your fingertips. Whether you want to take your business to the next level or take control of your family's future with an estate plan. LegalZoom plugs right into

your life so you can take care of things that matter the most. Get off to a strong start. 2018 at LegalZoom.com. Get special savings today when you enter Nancy, N-A-N-C-Y in the promo box at checkout. LegalZoom, where life meets legal. LegalZoom, thank you not only for being our partner today on SiriusXM 132, but also for what you do for Americans across the country every single day. LegalZoom.com. Now we head across the country to Texas. A three-year-old little girl, Sharon Matthews, goes missing.

Now listen to this. In the middle of the night, the moment I heard this story, it stunk. The moment I heard this story, I knew something was wrong. Because when police arrived to investigate the missing three-year-old little girl, Sharon, her dad says that he woke up in the middle of the night. He tried to give her milk. She written take it. So he punished her by making her go outside. I think it was at three o'clock in the morning and stand alone in the dark by a tree. And then he goes, suddenly had the urge to go do the laundry. Why is it when people do something wrong, they suddenly do the laundry, i.e. Scott Peterson and so many others?

I need to make a list of that, Jackie. Men who suddenly turn neat-nick after a murder. Okay, so he then leaves the little girl by the tree at 3 a.m to go do the laundry in an alleyway behind their huge mansion i google earth didn't look down at it it's a huge beautiful home this guy and his wife live in but there is an a little back street you know behind their yard that you know it goes behind all the homes yards there's a little street back there that's where he made the daughter stand so he goes out he says to check on her after he does the laundry and lo and behold Sharon is gone can you even imagine that we have just learned that the autopsy on little Sharon is complete and yes I said autopsy because a few days later her little was found inside a culvert not far from the home. Did I mention the fact that this alleyway,

this pathway is known for having coyotes? Yeah. Let's get to that autopsy. Joining me right now, investigative reporter and journalist joining us out of Dallas, Paul Chambers. Paul, what have we learned from the autopsy report on this three-year-old little girl? Well, Nancy, the bulk of information from that report is in the hands of officials, and they won't release it. Only the ruling, and that is that little Sharon Matthews died from homicidal violence, which means that someone intentionally, knowingly, or with criminal negligence caused the death of this three-year-old girl. Now, Dallas County routinely withholds autopsy reports, citing that they're part of open investigations. But county officials have asked the state attorney general to make a ruling on this particular

withholding because of the nature of the case and that it's really in the news quite a bit here in the Dallas area. You know, Joe Scott Morgan, it's breaking my heart. This little girl was just 36 inches tall. I mean, hold your hand up. 36 inches tall. And she only weighed 22 pounds. And I remember Sharon Matthews, this little three-year-old girl. She was adopted by this family, as I recall, from India.

Beautiful, beautiful little girl. She looks like a painting, these big brown eyes looking out at you. And she had been mistreated in India and had gone to a foster home, and they returned her. Everybody kicked her out. I think she may have been deaf. So people had a problem communicating with her. And she was so lonely that she would sit on the bottom step in foster care and wait for the caseworker to show up,

and started calling the caseworker mommy. I mean, Joe Scott, at three years old, sitting on a step, waiting for your caseworker, and that's who you think your mommy is? And then they thought that all the prayers had been answered, that she had this rich couple that was going to adopt her and love her. And now she's face down in the bottom of a culvert. Joe Scott. Yeah. You know, heartbreaking. It is an understatement. We had talked about early on in this case when you and I were covering it, Nancy, how we thought that maybe, you know, he had put her outside and coyotes came along. I never thought that.

I think we discussed the possibility, but did you actually ever think that? No, no, I really didn't. Based upon human behavior. some a baby outside at 3 a.m who loses a kid uh like this you know now watch it you remember john david went missing for about one minute in the baby zero superstore and i was hysterically dragging lucy behind me running up and down the aisles because my little elf had run three aisles away while I was crouched down at the bottom of the the shelf looking for organic sunscreen okay you do remember that story right and in the blink of the eye so some naughty people do lose

their children for a few moments but I mean that's a far cry from sending a baby out at 3 a.m to go stand by a tree and in an alley yeah all by herself in the middle of the night and it was it was alleged at the at the time that it was for punishment because she wouldn't uh take her milk uh that that was being given to her uh and you know he talked about she choked on the milk and all this other nonsense. What we do know, though, just as was characterized just a moment ago, this is we have five manners of death, Nancy. And when they use the term homicide or homicidal, that means, and let this sink in to everybody in the audience,

that means death at the hand of another. And that's the way we defined it. Now, while there is no specific cause of death listed as of yet, it's important to remember that they've gone so far to characterize the manner as being homicidal. And relative to that, and what really kind of, what really bothers me about this is that one report that I read, they're saying that there is extensive decomposition. So that opens up in a completely different door as to how they're going to pursue this case on into the future. To Karen Stark, psychologist, I mean, let's just start at the beginning. The story stinks from the get-go.

Yes, it does. I mean, you wouldn't even send your dogs outside at 3 a.m. alone. No way. But Nancy, that leads me to believe, we should all know this, that this is not an unusual punishment for this little girl. If this is what he thinks is how to punish her. And his story changes. Because first he says that he sent her out to punish her. But later on he says he was trying to get her to drink the milk.

And admits that he felt for a pulse he couldn't feel a pulse because she allegedly choked on the milk so something this little girl was not being treated right supposedly she was malnourished and um there's abuse that was taking place, I suspect, before this incident. I want to talk about that, Paul Chambers. Of course, I, as a former prosecutor, always love it when somebody changes their story. And I found out pretty quickly, prosecuting, that if you ask the correct questions, you might get embellishment. In other words, you might find out more of the story. You might find out that the bank robber had on a pair of gloves. You might find out that the bank robber had salt and pepper hair because you're asking specific questions and those details

may not have been included in the original statement. But when the statements begin conflicting with the original statement, then you got what we call a big fat liar. Okay. So her losing her pulse after choking on milk is far different from him saying, I made her go outside as punishment to stand under a tree at 3 a.m. And when I turned back, she was gone. What do we know about his conflicting statements, Paul Chambers? And where's mommy in this scenario?

Well, they're both, I can tell you right now, in the Dallas County Jail. But on October 7th was the date that little Sharon went missing. And the body was found on October 24th. And it was when the body was found is when the father changed his story and said that she died from choking on the milk. Now, we do know from testimony in November at a custody hearing for the Matthews other child, the four-year-old, who is their biological child. We know from testimony from a doctor at a child clinic where Sharon was taken several times over a period of a few months that Sharon suffered various injuries, according to this doctor, that were in several different states of healing.

She reported to Child Protective Services, this doctor, that Sharon was likely being abused. And Child Protective Services apparently dropped the ball and didn't act. As a matter of fact, the commissioner of CPS, Hank Whitman, has already admitted that his agency dropped the ball in this case. And little Sharon was allowed to remain in the custody of her parents. At least CPS, I can tell you, they acted quickly when Sharon was reported missing and they took the biological daughter away from the parents. Oh, yeah, they show up lickety-split when somebody's dead, when a dead body turns up. But Joseph Scott Morgan, how many times have you and I covered dead children cases, murdered children cases, tortured children cases where defects did nothing. Time after time after time after time, they get called.

They come to the house or don't come to the house. Nothing is done, and the child ends up dead. Okay, I got to confess something. I had a blowout in the airport over the holiday with a lady that I heard slapping her child in one of the bathroom stalls. Okay. I actually thought we were going to get into a physical fight. I know. Yes. Jackie's looking at me like, what?

Yes. So I took the children to go skating at Rockefeller Center, which was always one of my dreams. So I superimposed that onto the children and assumed it was their dream. So now my dream is to watch them living out my dream. And Karen, don't bother to unravel that barrel of snakes. Yeah, it's normal. So we're coming back. We're coming back and get off the plane. I take Lucy to the bathroom. Yeah, it's quite the spectacle but anyway this moment we were in the ladies bathroom

and lucy's right beside me and um i hear a mom yelling at a baby i don't hear the baby say anything and um then i hear a slap and i come and the baby starts crying and I hear another one and I head toward the stall Lucy's going mom don't get crazy and uh I there is a an attendant with her with a mop cart and all that standing there outside the the door too and I, did she just slap the baby? And the mop lady said, yes, yes, she did. So, okay, I looked into the lady and we got into it. Fur was flying, let me tell you. Long story short, she stormed out of that bathroom

and I stormed out right behind her. I mean, it was a scene. So what I don't get is how D-Fax, it was a toddler, Jackie. It was a little boy. I think it was a little boy, like maybe 36 inches tall, just like this little girl. So let me ask you this. How is it, Paul Chambers, investigative reporter and journalist joining me out of Dallas, that D-Facts knew the child was being abused and did nothing about it? Well, it's, you know, they're saying it just slipped through the cracks.

What crack? I mean, really, seriously, how does it slip through the cracks? You've got a child being tortured at home. How does that slip through the cracks? Well, they had the report by the doctor at the child clinic, and I'm sure a lot of these reports, you know, relate to them every day, and somehow they just didn't act. It's their job. They admit that they didn't, and they're trying to correct every day. And somehow they just didn't act. They admit that they didn't. And they're trying to correct the problem. CPS has had numerous problems in this state dealing

with abused or potentially abused children. And so they've got this guy, Hank Whitman, who was appointed by the governor probably about a year ago, and he is a very well-respected individual. He's been trying to change things at CPS. Well, God bless him. They need him times 10. So long story short, to Joe Scott Morgan, what does this mean, homicidal violence?

Why don't we know? Was she beaten? Was she asphyxiated? Was she stabbed? Why don't we know? Was she beaten? Was she asphyxiated? Was she stabbed? Why don't we know that? And how is a child autopsy different from an adult autopsy? Well, first off, let's talk about the trauma. Let me back up a little bit and say that based on the one report that I had read, there was extensive decomposition. If that is in fact the case, hopefully we'll get the report in our hands soon, but if that is in fact the case,

we have to consider that soft tissue trauma like stab wounds, they're not going to necessarily present themselves if the body is that severely decomposed. But I just can't see it because the child was not down that long. So I have to think that something else is going on. Now, when it comes to something like smothering, that's a completely different kettle of fish. But if she was choked, we could find hemorrhage in what are referred to as the strap muscles. And if folks at home will just kind of run their fingers alongside the sides of their throat and down to the center midline, that's where the strap muscles are, and we would find hemorrhage in there.

Now, as you know, I'm sorry, I can't remember the last part of the question, but the… How is a child autopsy different from an adult autopsy, if at all? Yeah, well, with a child autopsy, Nancy, we try to take care in every single autopsy that we do. But this is the rub. Children are not just supposed to spontaneously die. I think we can all agree on that. So they're going to take a really long, hard look at what could have brought about this child's death when a medical examiner or coroner goes into a case, particularly with a child death. We work from the assumption that this is, in fact, a homicide to begin with. That way we don't miss anything. So there'll be more extensive dissections that'll take place. There'll be more testing. So that gives me an indication that potentially, potentially, they're kind of playing their cards close to the vest on this case.

And, you know, we'll kind of see how it spins out going forward. Karen's talking. I'm looking at a photo of little Sharon right now. Do you know she's wearing an exact little dress that Lucy used to have? It's a Serco from Target, and it's got all these little, it looks like balloons on it, pink and purple and yellow and turquoise. She's just so precious. And I don't understand where the mother stands in all of this, Karen Stark.

If the dad is guilty, if, how can the mom stand by all of this, Karen Stark, if the dad is guilty, if. How can the mom stand by and let this happen? You know, I immediately start thinking about years and years ago, Nancy, something that we had talked about many times, the Joel Steinberg case, where the mother was the edge. Yep, and Hedda was as abused as the kids were. And the and again, the authorities, you know, that was reported to child protection over and over again. And nobody did anything. And I think just in the same way that, you know, the little girl would attach herself to the parent that was the abusing parent, the mother is afraid to speak up. I can think of, and the outrage of knowing stories like this where there was a concerned

professional involved who did report it and nothing was done for this beautiful little girl. We are on the case as it develops. Let me give you a toll-free number for National Child Help Hotline. 1-800-4-A-CHILD. 1-800-422-4453. Repeat, 800-422-4453. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.