Appeals Court Upholds Life Sentence For Woman That Sat On And Killed Child

February 18, 2020

The First District Court of Appeals has upheld the conviction and sentence of Veronica Posey for the first degree murder of a young girl by sitting on her.

Posey was convicted by an Escambia County jury and sentenced to life without parole on March 15, 2019, for the murder of her nine year-old cousin Dericka Lindsay.

On October 14, 2017, Posey was arrested after law enforcement was called to the home of Grace and James Smith for a report of an unresponsive child. It was later learned Grace Smith had summoned Posey, her niece, to the home to assist her in disciplining her adopted children.

During the punishment, Posey sat on the Linday’s back for several minutes as she was bent facedown into the seat of a chair. As a result, the child died from mechanical asphyxia. Posey weighed about 325 pounds at the time.

Evidence from the autopsy also showed the child had been severely beaten in the days prior to her death. Both Posey and Grace Smith admitted to striking the child. James Smith was also present in the room when the death occurred. Both he and Grace Smith admitted being present and doing nothing to intervene with Posey’s method of discipline.

On May 28, 2019, Grace Smith was sentenced to 20 years in state prison after being convicted by of aggravated manslaughter of a child and aggravated child abuse. On November 29, 2018, James Smith entered a plea straight to the court and received 10 years in state prison on one count of aggravated manslaughter of a child.

Comments

4 Responses to “Appeals Court Upholds Life Sentence For Woman That Sat On And Killed Child”

  1. Bewildered on February 19th, 2020 7:35 am

    I sound like a broken record because I voiced my same opinion when this story first broke. The ‘Smith couple’ should have never been allowed to adopt this young special.needs child. Political correctness strikes again in his worst form. There is a time in life for everything- at their age they were overwhelmed and unable to handle raising the girl from the start. What’s next? A judge will give an abandoned infant to 90 year old prospective parents? We won’t have age discrimination but definitely Insanity!

  2. Concerned Observer on February 18th, 2020 2:20 pm

    At first I thought maybe this was a misunderstanding (I have not read any of the previous news articles). As I read on, I realized that all three of these individuals are guilty of mistreating that poor child. Children need to be disciplined. But there’s a line and they absolutely crossed it.

  3. Chris Paul on February 18th, 2020 1:58 pm

    Sparky, Sparky,, Sparky

  4. JTV on February 18th, 2020 11:39 am

    Monster

Written by William Reynolds · Filed Under News