convicted<\/a> of capital murder and injury to a child causing serious bodily injury in the death of Melodi Sneed, according to the Tarrant County District Attorney\u2019s Office.<\/p>\nThe case stemmed from a July 27, 2019, family gathering at a newly purchased home on Eagle Drive in Mansfield.<\/p>\n
Melodi Found Unresponsive at Mansfield Home<\/p>\n
Prosecutors said family members had gathered at the home to help unpack and celebrate the move. Later that night, most of the adults went to bed while Melodi fell asleep on a couch in the home\u2019s game room.<\/p>\n
According to prosecutors, Sneed directed her 13-year-old son to leave the room before pressing a blue-and-white pillow over Melodi\u2019s face.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors said Sneed held the pillow over the girl\u2019s face for several minutes, despite Melodi\u2019s attempts to scream and fight back.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe fought. She screamed. She tried to stay alive,\u201d Assistant District Attorney Victoria Lydahl told jurors. \u201cBut she was only nine.\u201d<\/p>\n
After Melodi stopped moving, prosecutors said Sneed removed the pillow, wiped the girl\u2019s face, and took the pillow from the house.<\/p>\n
Hours later, Melodi was found unresponsive, and police were called. She was later pronounced dead at a hospital.<\/p>\n
Sneed\u2019s Son Told Police What He Saw<\/p>\n
Sneed\u2019s 13-year-old son later told investigators that he had witnessed his mother suffocating Melodi.<\/p>\n
According to prosecutors, Sneed also admitted to police that she had smothered the child.<\/p>\n
The prosecution\u2019s case relied in part on the son\u2019s account of what happened inside the game room.<\/p>\n
No motive for the killing was provided in the information released by prosecutors.<\/p>\n
Jury Returns Guilty Verdicts<\/p>\n
Jurors found Sneed guilty of capital murder and injury to a child causing serious bodily injury before sentencing her to two life terms.<\/p>\n
One of the life sentences is without the possibility of parole.<\/p>\n
During closing arguments, Assistant District Attorney Charlie Boulware emphasized the length of time Melodi\u2019s family had waited for the case to reach a conclusion.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday is about Melodi,\u201d Boulware said. \u201cMelodi\u2019s family has waited seven years, seven long years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Boulware also urged jurors to reach a verdict for Melodi and her family.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s extremely cruel and criminal, and there\u2019s only one person to blame,\u201d Boulware said.<\/p>\n
Tarrant County Assistant District Attorneys Boulware and Lydahl prosecuted the case. The Tarrant County District Attorney\u2019s Office also credited the Mansfield Police Department and its investigators for their work on the case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Tarrant County jury has sentenced a Mansfield woman to two life terms after finding her guilty in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1007126,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5138],"tags":[191804,55131,5229,7371,7372,403183,403181,403182,403186,403185,403188,403187,63709,403184,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-1007125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-worth","tag-191804","tag-9-year-old","tag-america","tag-fort-worth","tag-fortworth","tag-life-without-parole-texas","tag-mansfield-niece-murder","tag-melodi-sneed-killing","tag-melody-sneed","tag-mercia-sneed","tag-mercia-sneed-sentenced","tag-smother-with-pillow","tag-suffocation","tag-tarrant-county-capital-murder","tag-texas","tag-tx","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117112587730049523","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1007125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1007125"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1007125\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1007126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1007125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1007125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1007125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}