Content warning: This article contains graphic descriptions of child abuse and neglect. The hotline is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The 2-year-old was left inside a cold, dirty apartment, with no access to food or water.
Her mother wasn't there to tuck her in at night or change her diaper when it was soiled. Her mother wasn't there at all, for hours β sometimes days β Indianapolis police say. Skylar Gardner , 2, was found dead underneath a fallen lightweight dresser with her body already going into rigor mortis by the time the woman who was supposed to take care of her found the girl. While the toddler lived in filth and squalor among feces and mounds of trash with her 3-year-brother, her mother, Chantell Gardner was off with her boyfriend, Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department detectives allege in a probable cause affidavit for her arrest.
The Marion County Prosecutor's Office announced Thursday that Chantell Gardner was indicted on murder and neglect of a dependent resulting in serious bodily injury. Skylar Gardner: 2-year-old girl dead, Indianapolis mother arrested for neglect.
According to court records, Skylar's multiple injuries, including bruising over most of her body, bite marks on her back and arm, frostbite on her hands and feet, and a puncture wound near her neck, possibly caused by a rodent after her death. Skylar was found dead under a dresser in the block of Newberry Road at Timber Point Apartments when her mother stopped by to feed the children. He's accused of lying to hinder the case against Gardner. Thomas told police he hadn't been to Chantell Gardner's house in months.
He said Gardner would sleep at his apartment sometimes five days a week and rarely brought the kids. He told detectives he thought the kids were staying with Gardner's family when she was at his residence. The last time he saw the children, he told police, was at his home on his birthday in December The children's father lives in Ohio, but arrived at Gardner's apartment the day Skylar was found. He told detectives the last time he saw Skylar and her brother was around Thanksgiving.
