A Mother And Her Boyfriend Beat her 3-year-old Baby To Death And Put Her In A Freezer

A Northern California couple stored the body of the woman's three-year-old daughter in a suitcase and then in a freezer for three days after they beat the child to death, police said Tuesday.
Little Kayleigh Slusher was found dead in a bed in her mother's Napa home Saturday with blunt force trauma injuries and evidence of sexual assault.


Her mother, Sara Krueger, and the woman's boyfriend, Ryan Scott Warner, weren't home when the toddler was discovered, however, they were later accosted by police in a restaurant out of town.

Sara Krueger

Both Krueger, 23, and Warner, 26, were charged Tuesday with special circumstances murder and assault on a child causing death. Each of the counts carry a 25-year-to-life penalty.
The suspects told police they discovered Kayleigh dead late last week and had no idea how she died, the Napa Valley Register reported.

Ryan Scott Warner

The child's father, Jason Slusher, is incarcerated at San Quentin State Prison. He has been informed of his daughter's death.
Napa police received an anonymous phone call around 1 p.m. Saturday requesting a welfare check on a three-year-old at an apartment in Wilkins Avenue, Napa.
The couple, who both live at the apartment, were arrested Sunday on suspicion of murder in Kayleigh's death after someone recognized the wanted couple at a restaurant and tipped off authorities

Krueger and Warner became subjects of an intense search in the San Francisco Bay Area Saturday afternoon, Lt. Debbie Peecook said. A few hours earlier, around 10 a.m., witnesses had seen Krueger and Warner leaving the apartment with luggage, police said.
Neither suspect owns a car and they were not answering their cell phones.
Someone who spotted the couple at a restaurant near a Bay Area Rapid Transit station on Sunday in the city of El Cerrito alerted police, and BART officers detained them, Peecook said.
BART police Lt. Gil Lopez said they were detained without incident at the station in El Cerrito, about 30 miles south of Napa.

 

The property manager at Krueger's apartment building told the Napa Valley Register that in recent months, police visited the mother's residence for several disturbances, including late-night noise, slamming doors and neighbors reporting possible physical abuse of the child.
Warner 'moved in about 10 months ago, and it all went downhill from there,' Elizabeth Chechourka said.
'Management sent a letter to them about two and half weeks ago saying, ''The authorities know about you, and you need to shape up or you're gonna lose your housing,''' she added.
Peecook said Napa officers had made several welfare checks at Krueger's home, most recently last week but none of the visits resulted in an arrest.

She said she didn't know whether Napa County Child Protective Services had visited the apartment in response to any neighbors' complaints.

A family friend who often baby-sat the girl was baffled by news of the girl's death and her mother's arrest.

'Never saw her raise a hand to the girl. It was like pulling teeth getting her to somewhat discipline her,' Kindra Kunkel told reporters.
'This is not Sara; this is not the Sara I know,' said Kunkel. 'She fought so hard for her little girl.'

Source: Daily Mail