GUILTY CA - Kayleigh Slusher, 3, beaten to death, Napa, 30 Jan 2014

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kdgdid said:
Columbo said:
I found her fb page but couldn't find the comments. I'm not too well-versed on fb --that's probably why I couldn't find them![/
Click on her picture Dec4th 2013

It may take you awhile because spelling and grammar does not appear to be their strong suit:floorlaugh:
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bolded by me.

No big surprise there......
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Columbo said:
Is that possible? I thought that either LE or CPS did a welfare check on Kayleigh just a couple of days before they found her body.
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The NPD, supposedly. Apparently they didn't see little Kayleigh as it sounds like she was already dead.
 
This case has me so sad. What a beautiful little girl who never got the chance to grow up. So many wonderful people would have jumped over mountains to care for this child as their own. I saw the grandpa on TV last night and he was absolutely broken, crying and besides himself. I live an hour from Napa and this is all over the news in the Bay Area.

I'm mostly devastated because not enough was done to help this little girl. JMO
 
I work for CPS in my county. We can't investigate what isn't reported to us. I've known of a few times where my agency has known there was police involvement in an incident involving a child and it has been my agency who had had to make them call in a hot line report so that we could investigate the incident. Totally backwards. I live in "Meth Heartland" and have seen firsthand what it can do to parents. It's sad. It's disturbing. And most of all, it can lead to the most horrific crime imaginable. I'm thankful these two have been captured. I'm sorry for the family who loved that little girl. Just wait until this mother comes out of her drug induced coma. She will feel the gravity of her situation and have nothing but time on her hands to revel in it. That will be her true punishment.
 
http://napavalleyregister.com/news/...cle_c5b1d628-8bd2-11e3-8bdd-0019bb2963f4.html

ANOTHER EPIC FAILURE OF CPS !

“Kayleigh was Sara’s world; that’s why I don’t understand this. She fought tooth and nail to get out of (Child Protective Services) to get housing, just to keep her daughter.”
IMO
He has it wrong she might have fought tooth and nail just to keep her housing and benefits how else could she pay for her drugs.

Both are going to be charged in the childs murder. Hopefully they will get the death penalty attached to it.
 
http://napavalleyregister.com/news/...cle_c69799cc-8ec7-11e3-b6b5-0019bb2963f4.html

Linda Canan, Child Welfare Services director, said her agency had wanted to talk to the public.

“We, in Child Welfare Services, want to be open and transparent with the community. We did nothing wrong,” she said Wednesday. “I really want to reassure the community that they have a good quality Child Welfare program.”

This is a woman in CYA mode.Since when does CPS in any state ever tell the public anything. It is always confidential when minors are involved. When we were fighting for our abused grandson and his sis, we saw first hand how CPS tells the judge how to handle their cases because they protect the state from law suits. You would not believe the corruption in NJ COS and I am talking about supervisors not caseworkers. Whole system needs overhauling and accountability to the public who pays them to protect all children. Sorry to rant but until you are the one fighting for an abused loved one , you really have no idea how corrupt it is. When my son went to court to try to get emergency custody , the judge said we have to wait til CPS investigation is over.Leaving a 4 and 7 yr old living with mommy and her abusing boyfriend.Boyfriend was to have no contact , week later it was proven he went back to living there and nothing was done ! Sorry to rant just wish there was a way to expose it so it does become a real Childrens Protection Agency.
 
mikeysmommom said:
http://napavalleyregister.com/news/...cle_c5b1d628-8bd2-11e3-8bdd-0019bb2963f4.html

ANOTHER EPIC FAILURE OF CPS !

“Kayleigh was Sara’s world; that’s why I don’t understand this. She fought tooth and nail to get out of (Child Protective Services) to get housing, just to keep her daughter.”
IMO
He has it wrong she might have fought tooth and nail just to keep her housing and benefits how else could she pay for her drugs.

Both are going to be charged in the childs murder. Hopefully they will get the death penalty attached to it.
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And right after they were notified they were gonna lose their housing they killed that sweet little girl. They did not need her anymore.
 
Her fb page is gone, can anyone tell me what the comments from ppl that knew her said? If we're not allowed to write about it on the forum you can PM me- tyia
 
Poor little child. The death penalty is appropriate for her killers.
 

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The trial was supposed to start on February 6th but it probably got pushed back.

http://napavalleyregister.com/news/local/register-reporters-anticipate-the-big-stories-of/article_0140c049-ad1d-5810-8d30-5839f8e19859.html

Sara Lynn Krueger, 26, and Ryan Scott Warner, 29, were arrested on Feb. 2, 2014 in connection with the death of Krueger’s 3-year-old daughter, Kayleigh Slusher. The couple is accused of murder with a special allegation that the murder was intentional and involved torture as well as assault on a child causing death.

A jury trial is scheduled for Feb. 6. Although only one trial is scheduled for both Krueger and Warner, each defendant will have separate juries, according to court documents.
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One trial, two juries: Slusher murder trial about to begin

http://napavalleyregister.com/news/local/one-trial-two-juries-slusher-murder-trial-about-to-begin/article_7069ffd0-e9fa-57c9-b200-132591fb56e2.html

The couple accused of killing 3-year-old Kayleigh Slusher back in 2014 will be sharing a courtroom but not a jury when attorneys make their opening statements in Napa County Superior Court on May 1.

Sara Lynn Krueger, 26, and Ryan Scott Warner, 29, who both face charges of murder for their alleged involvement in the death of Krueger’s daughter, Kayleigh, have been in custody of the Napa County jail without bail since their arrests on Feb. 2, 2014.

“Sometimes when you have two people who are at least accused of being involved in a crime, you have to treat them as separate parties because they might have separate interests and separate outcomes,” said Court Executive Officer Richard D. Feldstein. Since a large portion of evidence and testimony for a trial like this may overlap, he said, it makes more sense to hold one trial.

“In these cases … normally speaking, you have both juries there for maybe 80 percent, and one or the other jury for the remaining 20 percent,” Feldstein said. “They’re treated totally as two separate juries and they will be in separate deliberation rooms,” he said. “They don’t talk to each other or anything like that.”
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Jury selection for Kruger will begin the week of April 17 with jury selection for Warner beginning the following week on April 24, according to court documents. Opening statements are scheduled to begin May 1. The trial is expected to last eight weeks with a planned conclusion date of June 9.

Krueger and Warner are also accused of a special allegation that the murder was intentional and involved torture as well as assault on a child causing death.
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Kayleigh murder trial: Prosecutor says mother chose drugs over her daughter's welfare

The opening salvo in what is expected to be a month-long murder trial of two defendants in the death of Kayleigh Slusher -- her mother Sara Krueger and her boyfriend Ryan Scott Warner -- began Monday morning in Napa County Superior Court.

“She would’ve turned 7 this Wednesday,” Deputy District Attorney Lance Hafenstein said in his opening statement about Kayleigh, the 3-year-old girl who died in her mother’s apartment back in 2014.

“The defendant (Kruger) had silenced Kayleigh but her body still spoke volumes,” Hafenstein continued. The coroner identified 41 distinct external injuries on the girl’s body, all of which occurred while she was still alive, he said. Kayleigh’s body showed that she had an injury to the front of her spine, had endured blunt force trauma to her abdomen and, in addition to having a broken rib, was dehydrated.

“He determined in the end that Kayleigh was literally beaten to death,” Hafenstein said.

Kayleigh’s injuries would have been “painful every time she took a breath,” he said – this time causing a woman watching the proceedings to tear up.

Why did Kayleigh have to die? Because her mother chose methamphetamine over her, because she was getting in the way of her drug use, Hafenstein surmised.
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After Hafenstein made his opening presentation to the jury, Krueger's attorney, Jim McEntee summed up his defense.

McEntee said that it’s true that “a little girl did suffer” and that she was “as cold as ice” when they found her, but these facts are sensational and are not proof that her mother murdered her.

That same week, Krueger and Warner had been fighting, McEntee said. Krueger told him to leave, but he said that the only way he would leave was if police were involved and, if that happened, he would call his friends, whom Krueger feared, McEntee said. So Warner stayed.

Thursday – while Krueger slept – is when Kayleigh was no longer fine, McEntee said. Warner punched the little girl “so hard,” he said, leaving her abdomen bruised. “That blow caused her small intestine to rupture … and she ultimately died due to an infection,” he said.

When Krueger woke up, she found Kayleigh dead on the bathroom floor, McEntee said. Krueger was in and out of consciousness due to the shock, he said.

“She did not report the incident and she was present but perhaps not aware of what Warner was doing to the child’s body” in regards to the refrigerator, McEntee said. The two fled the scene, trading a PlayStation for a ride to Vallejo, he said.
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Kayleigh murder trial: Warner's defense attorney says mother was the abusive one

Warner had been living with Krueger and Kayleigh for about six months at the time of Kayleigh’s death, Hafenstein said. After he was taken into custody, he told police that despite the fact that Sara wasn’t really his girlfriend – that the two hadn’t labeled their relationship – he had been taking more care of Kayleigh than her own mother, Hafenstein said.

Warner thought that Kayleigh was behind in her potty-training, Hafenstein said, so he took it upon himself to help her. That's what he told police he was doing the last night Kayleigh was seen alive, he said.

Kayleigh had been sick earlier that day -- Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2014 -- and, thinking that maybe she was constipated, Warner sat her on the toilet. He left her sitting on the toilet and went to sleep, Hafenstein said.

When Krueger woke up around 4 p.m. on Thursday, Warner heard her yell “Why is my daughter sleeping on the bathroom floor? Oh my God, Ryan, she’s dead,” Hafenstein told the jury.

Warner told the police that they didn’t call 911 because they had been using drugs, Hafenstein said. Warner folded up Kayleigh’s body, placed her in red duffel bag and left the apartment with Krueger. They walked from their apartment complex to Target where they purchased ice cream “like it was any other day,” he said.

Since it would be days or even weeks before he thought Kayleigh’s body would be found, Warner put her body in the freezer supposedly to “preserve” it for autopsy, Hafenstein said. Warner told police that Kayleigh’s body was left there overnight, Hafenstein said.
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In his opening statement, Warner's defense attorney, Mervin C. Lernhart Jr. tried to shift blame for Kayleigh's death to her mother. “It’s probably that the injury that caused Kayleigh’s death was inflicted by someone who lived in the apartment."

Warner noticed that Krueger was being harsher with her discipline of Kayleigh, Lernhart said. The two got into an argument about Krueger’s treatment of not only Kayleigh but of Warner as well the same week of the little girl’s death, Lernhart said.

On Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2014, not long before Napa Police came for a second welfare check, Kayleigh began vomiting or maybe even dry heaving, Lernhart said. Warner had been cleaning a pipe using a cleaning solution that he had put into a measuring cup.

“Ryan and Sara believed Kayleigh was sick because she drank the fluid in this cup,” Lernhart said. Krueger told a friend that she had called poison control, but she didn’t, he said. Instead, they gave Kayleigh water to try and flush out the suspected poison.
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That same evening, Lernhart said that Warner heard yelling and crying from one of the bedrooms. When he went to check it out, it looked like Krueger might have been spanking Kayleigh, so Warner stopped her, Lernhart said.

When Warner put Kayleigh on the toilet, then fell asleep, Lernhart said Krueger later told police that she didn't wake up until 4 p.m.

“Perhaps Sara was not being truthful when she said she had slept until 4 p.m.," he said. She responded to a text message that morning around 11 a.m., he said, saying that she, Warner and Kayleigh had to leave town.

The best case scenario, he said, is that both Warner and Krueger were "frightened" and "scared" thinking that they had poisoned Kayleigh. But Warner wasn't responsible for any abuse, he said -- if anything, he might be guilty of being an accessory after the fact.
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Kayleigh murder trial, Day 2: The grandmother testifies

The second day of the Kayleigh Slusher murder trial began with the prosecution calling seven witnesses, including the 3-year-old child’s grandmother, Robin Slusher.

Robin Slusher’s testimony, along with that of other family members and neighbors, described Krueger as a once attentive mother who became less so following her relationship with Warner.

Slusher, mother of Kayleigh’s father, Jason Slusher, said she first met Krueger when she was 17, before she and Slusher’s son, Jason, started dating. When Krueger was 18 or 19, Slusher said she let the young woman move into her home for a couple of years while she dated her son.

“I got to see her a lot,” Slusher said in response to Deputy District Attorney Lance Hafenstein’s questioning. “I could see her whenever I wanted.”

Slusher said Krueger started to put limits on her time with Kayleigh around Halloween of 2013. Kayleigh didn’t see her grandmother on Halloween like she usually did and Krueger hadn’t even sent her a photo of Kayleigh in her costume, she said.

“Christmas, I got to see her for about 45 minutes,” she said. “Everything was so rushed … we were just ripping them (the presents) open. I can’t even tell you what her (Kayleigh’s) demeanor was like because it was so rushed.”

When Slusher saw Kayleigh for the last time it was to see the movie “Frozen.” She had a bruise on her face, Slusher said, that Krueger said was from bumping her head.

Krueger had lost a lot of weight, Slusher said, and her skin didn’t look good.

About a week went by and Slusher, who had not seen Kayleigh since the movie, called the police anonymously. She called again on Jan. 29, 2014 and talked to an officer. The officer called back 28 minutes later, Slusher said.
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Another neighbor, Abernathy, testified that she would sometimes hear yelling and screaming from the apartment.

A week before Kayleigh was found dead, Abernathy said she heard a sound coming from Krueger’s apartment that shook her own.

“It sounded like something was thrown against the wall,” she said.

On Sunday before Kayleigh was found, she said she saw Kayleigh riding her bike outside by herself, which was unusual, and that she seemed “slow.”
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Officer Garrett Wade of the Napa Police was the final witness of the day.

Wade had visited the Krueger home on Jan. 29 – the second of two welfare checks made by police the week of Kayleigh’s death.

Wade told the court that he saw two “pea-sized” bruises on Kayleigh’s chin that Krueger said were caused when the girl fell off her bike. Since Kayleigh was dressed in pajamas and was held in Krueger’s arms during most of his visit, he could clearly see only her face, not any bruises on her body, he said. The apartment was “moderately clean,” he said, toys were on the floor in Kayleigh’s room and, when he saw Kayleigh walk, she seemed to be walking normally.

Wade, a drug recognition expert, noticed that Warner’s cheeks were sunken in and that his face was sweaty. After checking his heart rate and pupils, though, Wade said that that no one in the home seemed to be under the influence of drugs nor was there any drug paraphernalia visible.

Kayleigh vomited on Krueger who, after saying that Kayleigh had the flu, asked the police to leave, he said.

“I noticed toys but nothing unusual that I would need to investigate further,” Wade said. He said that when he learned of Kayleigh’s death on Feb. 1, he was “surprised.” When prosecutors asked how this news affected him, Wade put his head in his hands and cried.
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Crying in the courtroom: Officer recounts day he found Kayleigh Slusher's body

Officer Robert Chambers first visited the apartment to check out a reported disturbance on the morning of Jan. 27, 2014 after a neighbor called about a loud argument in a neighboring apartment.

Krueger sat down on the couch in the living room while Chambers spoke with her – Kayleigh sat on her lap, Chambers said. There were no signs that a struggle or any domestic violence had occurred in the home, he said. Krueger said that she and Warner had been fighting over money, he told the court.

Five days later, on Feb. 1, Chambers was called back to the same apartment complex. He was told that something had happened with a little girl, he said.

There was a “smoky haze” in the apartment that hadn’t been there earlier in the week, like someone had been smoking inside with all of the windows closed, Chambers said. He announced their presence, he said, but there was no response.

“I could see a face,” Chambers said. “I thought it was a doll,” he said, getting emotional. “… I realized that it was the little girl I had talked to a couple of days ago.”
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Judge Francisca P. Tisher issued a 15-minute break. Krueger was given the option to leave the courtroom, but decided to stay. Tisher noted for the record that “Ms. Krueger was sobbing loudly” and told her that she needed to try to maintain her composure.

After the break, Lind said she had only one more photo to show during Chambers’ testimony. A wave of silent horror seemed to come over the crowd as the final photo was shown.

An up-close photo of the bed in the little girl’s room appeared on the screen – Kayleigh’s pale, lifeless body was tucked under three blankets. The one closest to her – the pink one – cradled her tilted head, blonde hair peeking out from under it. The area around her eyes looked dark, her lips looked dark, her face was bruised. Disney princesses smiled above her on the bed’s headboard.

“She had blood coming from her nostril,” Chambers said, continuing to describe the scene. Her eyes were pale and there were bruises underneath her eyes, he said. It looked like the girl had been dead for some time, but still he checked her pulse and found none.

“Her skin was just ice cold,” he said.
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The person who called police to the scene, Warner’s childhood friend Antonio Valdez, also took the stand on Wednesday.

Valdez said it was about 12:30 or 1 a.m. on Feb. 1 when he showed up to Krueger’s apartment at Warner’s request. He said he thought that maybe Warner was having a problem with a neighbor.

When he learned that Warner had called him there because there was a little girl dead inside the apartment, Valdez said he became angry.

He told them that they needed to call the police before he did, he said. In the morning, after a restless night, Valdez made a call to his local law enforcement agency, the Richmond Police.
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Kayleigh Slusher murder trial postponed until Monday

Day four of the Kayleigh Slusher murder trial was unexpectedly postponed Thursday morning.

Superior Court Judge Francisca P. Tisher apologized to the jurors, who were all present, and to the audience for postponing Thursday’s as well as Friday’s court sessions, citing a “very serious family emergency.” Additional details about the postponement were not available.
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This poor child never knew what it felt like to be loved or comforted, she never knew the safety, security and contentment of a mothers love, let alone any nurture or encouragement of a loving and protecting mother.
So many others would have loved to adopt her.
 
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