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Subscribe to RSSA Houston jury sentenced 24-year-old Jessica Tata to 80 years in prison for the death of 6-month-old Elias Castillo. Watch the sentencing.
A Texas woman convicted of murder after a fire at her home day care resulted in the death of four children was sentenced Tuesday to 80 years in prison.
Last week, Jessica Tata was convicted of felony murder in the February 24, 2011, death of 16-month-old Elias Castillo. The child was among four kids who died after Tata left a group of children alone in a Houston home with a pan of oil cooking on a hot stove. She had gone shopping at a nearby Target store when the deadly blaze broke out. Three other children were injured.
In addition to the 80 years of prison time, Tata was ordered to pay a $10,000 fine, The Associated Press reported. The punishments came after the sequestered jury deliberated Tata's sentence for 5-1/2 hours on Monday and resumed discussions Tuesday morning.
AP Photo/Houston Chronicle, Johnny Hanson
Home day care operator Jessica Tata was convicted of murder on Nov. 13.
Tata will be eligible for parole in 30 years, according to the Houston Chronicle. The 24-year-old didn't say anything after the verdict was read, according to Houston's NBC-affiliate KPRC.
On Monday, prosecutors asked the jury to sentence Tata to life in prison, arguing that the now-24-year-old "doomed" the children when she left them home alone, the AP reported. In addition to Castillo, 20-month-old Elizabeth Kojah, 20-month-old Kendyll Stradford and 3-year old Shomari Dickerson died in the fire, according to KPRC.
"What each mom will do to hold their baby one more time," prosecutor Connie Spence told jurors, according to the AP. "What's a child's life worth? ... What we want is justice."
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Tata's defense attorneys had asked jurors to not be swayed by anger, claiming that Tata was a good person who made a terrible mistake, the AP reported.
"She (Tata) called them her babies" attorney Mike DeGeurin told jurors, according to the AP. "She didn't want those babies to be harmed."
After the fire, Tata fled to Nigeria but was later captured and has been in jailed in the U.S. since March 2011, the AP reported. She has Nigerian citizenship, though she was born in the United States.
Tata still faces three more counts of felony murder for the other children who died, the AP reported, as well as three counts of abandoning a child and two counts of reckless injury to a child for the three who were hurt.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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So very sad.
Woah... Texas jury let her off easy.
Fat lady hasn't sung yet in this case. The sentence was for the death of only one of the children...
"Last week, Jessica Tata was convicted of felony murder in the February 24, 2011, death of 16-month-old Elias Castillo."
...
"Tata still faces three more counts of felony murder for the other children who died, the AP reported, as well as three counts of abandoning a child and two counts of reckless injury to a child for the three who were hurt."
So yeah, it maybe seem light, but Texas isn't finished with her yet.
Stuttgart, what she was shopping for is really irrelevant to the situation. The fact that she left at all to shop is the salient point.
Let her die the same way she let those innocent children die. I wouldn't leave my boys alone in the house for 5 minutes and they are 10 and 6 and yet she left babies by themselves with a pan of oil on the stove cooking. I'm shocked and appalled that anyone could think it was okay to go shopping while you are supposed to be caring for children regardless of the pan of oil but that makes it even worse. It makes you wonder just how many times she left those kids by themselves.
Stupid b!tch. I hope you get ripped apart in prison.
And, AZ, some of us who aren't bloodthirsty savages hope she makes the most of her long time in prison to come to grips with her appallingly bad judgment, and make what amends she can, though obviously she can't undo the tragic results of her horrible choices. Perhaps she can learn a skill and help fellow inmates improve themselves, which would be good for us all as many will eventually be back among us.
Justme-123
If they were your children, would you still feel the same way?
KILL THE BITCH...
Some of us who aren't bloodthirsty savages don't give a damn what she does with her life after having murdered those poor children. The only skill I'd care to hear that she has mastered is rope-tying. In the interest of inmate reform, I'll send her the rope and the step stool.
Justme-123... are you friggin nuts? Her "bad judgement"?? What she did was just plain stupidity and as a 24 year old she certainly should have known better - not only to not leave the babies alone for any period of time, but also not to leave a pot of boiling oil on her stove! That shouldn't have been there in the first place while the kids were with her anyway!
They should have sentenced her to at least life, with NO possibility of parole. I realize she did not do this with any malice towards the children - it was an accident - but one that very well could have been prevented had she not been an idiot.
Hopefully, the next couple of sentencing hearings will keep her behind bars until her death. Remembering that she did flee the country after this happened should well be yet another incentive to keep her behind bars with no parole. She is a stupid, idiotic and selfish woman because of what she did to those 4 who died, and the others that got hurt.
I have no compassion for this lady. And neither will her fellow inmates I hope.
I don't know how one can even call this an accident. She deliberately walked out of her home, leaving all those children alone. That is sheer absolute deliberate neglect and playing a form of Russian Roulette. For someone who claims to have called those children her babies, I would hate to see how she would have treated her own children. Oh wait, we have a good idea how she would have.She just got caught because of the fire, This time and it killed four precious angels and nearly killed others.
It is the bottom of the human heap for any adult to allow such helpless babies to be placed in a situation where they have no one to watch out for them. While such a person drives away to go on any errand. Let alone shopping to fulfill a narcissistic desire and leaves something boiling on the stove which can catch fire. At her age, she isn't that ignorant to not know oil won't catch fire if too hot.
If one didn't know better, they would think that woman was trying to allow something to happen. Then she flees the country to hide from accepting responsibility for her actions. Apparently she wasn't a very responsible person to begin with, was she? Did she really think her other country would hide her forever?She doesn't give her country much credit does she. Plus for the jury not to be swayed by anger, right
I wouldn't be surprised if she had left those kids alone before, and only because of this fire, was she caught. Foolish people don't always get caught the first time by their actions. But their habits will catch up with them sooner or later, one can count on it.
How on earth she will ever be able to look herself in the mirror, I have no idea.This is one woman who obviously failed at compassion and responsibility. Degrading the name of womanhood.May she never forget the faces and names of those who died until the day she dies herself.
They need to set her Cell on fire with her in it!!!!!
This is just terrible...so very sad for all involved.
And whats worse is she fled, only concerned about herself, typical. It's as bad as a mother or father screaming outside of a burning house, "Help, my children are up there!" Why did you walk out of a burning house without your children? Why would this idiot leave someone else's children alone like she did, must have got that check.
Texas is an uncivilized place.
This horrific act does not fall under the murder category and I hope her lawyer appeals.
This is child abandonment.
Criminal negligence causing death multiple times over.
Even manslaughter multiple times over.
If the sentence for all of the above charges I list equals 80 years then so be it.
However it is not murder.
Criminal negligence causing death multiple times over, of babies, someone else's babies. Someone who is paying her fat a@& to watch them. Then she fled the country. Call it what you want, her actions directly resulted in the death of innocent children. Way to stand up for her though, buddy! I hope it makes your big liberal heart and your tiny brain feel warm and fuzzy.
The above sentence was for one death...
Texas ain't done with her sorry arse.
I agree with Cory- she had the nerve to flee to another country! Talking about the need for emigration reform.....we let her type over without batting an eye, while simultaneously kick the a***** of Hispanics who come over to work their a***** off! We really need to start making better choices about the types of emigrants we want here- I know it was written that she was born here, but at least one parent must be an emigrant, otherwise she could not hold dual citizenship....
cory...I don't think many liberals give a damn about this lady.
This was not murder, it was negligence. I don't know if I think she deserves a different sentence but we should call it what it is. And I guess Cory thinks that having a sensible opinion makes one a liberal, since there was nothing political about this story.
Cory - nobody is trying to deny the seriousness of the fact that children died - however, this is nothing more than negligence, it is NOT murder. I sure hope you realize that there is a difference between this, and someone walking up and shooting those children in the head.
It's not "liberal", it is "level headed". It scares the bejezus out of me to think that the US has become a land of knee-jerk criminal punishment.
Do you SERIOUSLY feel that this woman deserves the electric chair, hanging, lethal injection?
Who knows what the rules are for Nigeria for citizenship. Maybe she just lived there for a few years and got citizenship. Also, it is immigration, and immigrates. Emigrates and emigration is when you leave a country for another, not when you come to a country. So Mexican's would emigrate from Mexico and immigrate to the US.
"Legal experts say that if prosecutors can prove the deaths occurred because she abandoned the children to go shopping, they don't need to prove intent to harm to secure a murder conviction. Under Texas law, a person can be convicted of felony murder if he or she committed an underlying felony and that action led to the death."
What is it with texas anyway. First, someone pulls a load of vets onto the railroad tracks knowing good and well, being a proffesional driver, red means stop. Someone actually has the nerve to sue the railroad because the driver ran the flashing red lights? Second, over a hundred vehicles drive as fast as they can through fog just to smash into a pile of rubble. And now this! Are you guys alright down there?? Sun's not cookin your brains is it?
She's a good person who made a terrible mistake? Yeah, I don't think so. A good person would not have followed up this accident by fleeing to Nigeria.
If you're going to nail a convicted DUI murderer to the wall, why not her? Yeah 30 years for parole is too kind. She murdered 3 babies. Hopefully the next two cases offer just as stiff a penalty and they do not run concurrently.
I hope to see life without the possibility of parole. Baby murderer.
I feel sorry for people whose lives have been so dull that they would believe that this women has to be some kind of cold blooded killer. Sometimes things just go wrong, very wrong. Especially if you are stupid, selfish.......................
Nobody is saying she meant to kill the babies...it just doesn't matter. Her job was to take care of them. At the bare minimum, keep them alive. Leaving them at home with grease on the stove is as stupid as they come.
If a 14 yr old can get life for accidently killing his friend while wrestling....she should get life without question.
This tragedy was truely horrible. She deserves a harsh punishment but Murder? I would say her lawyer was asleep at the wheel that Murder stuck. You have to prove planning... Malice.
Don't get me wrong, what she did is HORRIBLE. But I don't think it fits the legal definition of MURDER.
There is a lot this article isn't saying about the situation.
She lied about where she was when the fire started; she originally said she was in the bathroom when it broke out.
There was a statement in the first story last year about her starting a fire when she was in school, but the record was sealed because she was a juvenile. Reporters couldn't get any more information about that.
She lied on her grant application when she got the license for the day care, and her mother helped her defraud the state so she could get the license.
And then we have the fact that she ran away to Nigeria and was turned in by a relative who wanted the reward money that was offered for her.
She left helpless babies alone while she went shopping at Target. Yep, that's murder. I don't care what color you are.
Mimi, I am not sure what color has to do with it but leaving helpless babies alone while going shopping in not murder. That is neglect, child endangerment, etc. The legal definition of murder requires intent. Now if she set the house on fire on purpose as you suggest, that is a whole different ball game.
Murder doesn't necessarily require intent if you are already doing something illegal. For example, if you rob a bank and someone is killed, that's murder. It doesn't matter if you didn't intend to kill anyone. You don't even have to have been the one to actually pull the trigger. Your felonious act caused the death. If it's a felony in Texas to leave young children unattended (which it probably is, but i don't know for sure), then it's murder.
"She was a good person who made a mistake". How is leaving 4 children alone in a house to go shopping a mistake?
She will be eligible for parole in 30 years, so that means each child's life, was worth 7.5 years of her life because of a "mistake".
Not such a good person.
That sentence is only for one child. Three more to go. If they make the sentences consecutive, she'll never be eligible for parole.
Good. She is a filthy animal and a coward who ran away instead of facing the music for leaving several children in a death trap. See ya.
Not buying it, leaving oil in a pan to catch on fire and leaving the house, sounds more like arson and premeditated murder. No one is that stupid.
Sadly I could see her out after 30 years on parole and at 54 and opening up another day care center. Life WITHOUT The possibility of parole is the minimum she should get.
I firmly believe that some crimes like this are so heinous that despite probably not being premeditated that they deserve the death penalty.
But she is either so stupid to do what she did or it was premeditated and either way she doesn't deserve 3 squares and a bed for the next 30-80 years.
should have been put to death........what's wrong texas...don't like to execute women??
A terrible tragedy. No one who hasn't experienced a similar horror can fully understand the agony felt by the parents of the children who died in the fire. Nevertheless, it was a terrible tragedy, an accident not a premeditated event. The defendant probably should do serious jail time and even two or three decades would effectively make it a life sentence in many ways. BUT 80 years just for the first charge is an absurdity.
At some point in the future (hopefully sooner as opposed to later) Americans will look back in amazement at this period of raging, vindictive juries, and the draconian sentences they approve put forth by the prosecutors and judges who are often power drunk and/or receiving financial kick backs or other powerful incentives from the Prisons for Profit system. Future generations will be amazed that so many states, such as Texas, were so openly corrupted by a modern day slave trade industry.
True, this isn't the best example of an extremely harsh sentence as the tragedy was so horrific and it's very easy to vilify the defendant. But when you allow ANY ridiculously heavy handed sentence the door is kicked wide open to justify sentencing a woman to 5 years for having happy, consensual sex with adult men who were the woman's ex-students, which in this time of hysterical over-reacting, somehow makes the woman a criminal worthy of prison even though NO ONE involved wants it to happen (also happened in Texas, surprise, surprise).
People of the future are going to look back and shudder with relief not to be living in this time period; just like we do at the period of the late 1800's and wonder how ordinary citizens could have been burned at the stake for being "witches" or even sixty, seventy years ago when others were being hung for sport just because of the color of their skin. The tune may being played a little bit softer but it's still the same old song and dance of inhumanity with a shockingly indifferent or frighteningly delighted public singing and dancing along.
Two radically different sources about the evils of Prisons for Profit:
cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2012/May/Nation-of-Criminals-Selling-Prisons-for-Profit/
commondreams.org/view/2012/04/25-7
There is something very wrong with this whole situation. Leaving young children alone in the best of circumstances is dangerous and unwarranted. This woman not only left those children unattended, but she had oil cooking on a stove. I find it impossible to believe that she had no idea something horrible would happen given how she left the apartment. 80 seems too small a sentence for what she did.
There's no doubt that her actions caused the death of the children, but doesn't "murder" imply a deliberate intent to kill? What was her motive?
She was probably only thinking about all the attention she would get, sympathy, etc...etc...people helping her out during this tragic time...who knows what goes through the head of a pyromaniac, anyway.
I tend to assume stupidity before I assume malice.
If I was on the jury, the prosecution would have to convince me that she left the oil on the stove with intent to kill.
Idiots burn down houses all the time. Sometimes people die. But that's manslaughter, not murder.
I worked with a moron at a restaurant who couldn't figure out how to put soap and a splash of bleach in the mop water. One day he added ammonia and bleach in large quantities. The resulting poisonous gas (homemade mustard gas) required the restaurant to be evacuated and a hazmat team called in. He could easily have caused permanent injury or death to himself, his coworkers, and the customers. But this was not attempted murder, it was idiocy and ignorance. (he also kept asking my wife out, unable to remember she was married.)
I'm not saying it wasn't murder, I'm just saying the article doesn't give me enough information to convince me. I wasn't in the courtroom. There might have been evidence of maliciousness presented that isn't mentioned in the article.
I think some need to understand that "Murder" does not necessarily include a premeditated intent. Many states have several "grades" of murder, if you will. If a premeditated intent is established it is first-degree murder. Second degree murder applies if no intent is discerned but the death is the direct result of extreme negligence or indifference that results in death of another, like drunk driving. Third degree murder covers accidental death, like losing control of one's car, while sober, and having a wreck...in some jurisdictions manslaughter effectively replaces 2nd and 3rd degree murder with voluntary and involuntary manslaughter. The article only states she was convicted of murder in one of the deaths, and has not yet been convicted on the remaining deaths and the injuries. A judge could require her to serve sentences consecutively, instead of concurrently...meaning she might be paroled on sentence #1 in 30 years, but that just means she *starts* serving time for sentence #2. If she makes parole for that one, she just starts serving #3.
And remember just because she's eligible doesn't mean she gets parole.
Leaving the oil cooking is kind of like lighting the fuse on a stick of dynamite and running for the exit. Like rolling a lit cigarette and matches in a piece of paper, a fuse, allowing the person time to get away before the fire breaks out. That's what makes it premeditated. I say she knew what she was doing!
That sentence was only for One death, more to come.
She looks to me to have an attitude.
Probably would be better for all if she just walked the plank as a matter of speaking.
Seems a shame to condemn another life but it has to be done for the sake of others.
Big business kills, maims, and disables millions of people, as well of millions of wild creatures and get government handouts. This lady did a really stupid, but not premeditated act. Cigarette companies acts are premeditated. they cost the world billions in healthcare and they make 80 billion. She looks like she has an attitude. Why? Is that because she is black. I am sure none of the nameless, blameless cowards above never lied when found out
Adults who smoke are making a choice. Even if they started as minors, adults have the choice to quit. Children left alone to burn to death are not remotely comparable. Did you light up one of those non-regulated medical cigarettes this morning?
Caring for children is a HUGE responsibility, not to be taken lightly. Just because childcare workers are extremely underpaid doesn't mean that the job isn't very demanding. It's long, hard hours, a lot of work and no respect. But, children are our future, how important is that to us?
her defense attorneys are idiots..."a good person that made a horrible mistake"...yes mistakes happen. but not like this. it was her CHOICE to leave those babies alone with oil in a frying pan on a hot stove to go shopping at Target. she deserves life in prison and better not get parole in 30 years. those mothers who lost their babies will never get to have their babies back in their lives again...therefore this stupid woman does not deserve to ever be free again based on the CHOICE she made.