ATLANTA — Cortney Bell, the Newton County woman who was convicted in the death of her infant daughter in 2017, had her conviction overturned by the Georgia Supreme Court.
The court ruled, in Bell v The State, that there was insufficient evidence to prove that Bell was guilty of contributing to the death of her daughter, Caliyah.
“Because we conclude based on the facts of this case that the evidence was insufficient to authorize a jury to conclude that Caliyah’s death was proximately caused by Bell’s conduct as alleged in the indictment, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals,” Justice John J. Ellington wrote in the court’s unanimous opinion.
Bell’s boyfriend, and Caliyah’s father, Christopher McNabb, was found guilty of murder in Caliyah’s death and his convictions were upheld by the state Supreme Court last year. He is currently serving a life sentence.
Bell lived with McNabb and reportedly the two smoked methamphetamine the night before two-week-old Caliyah was killed. On Oct. 7, 2017, Bell woke up to find her 2-year-old child had found Caliyah missing from her crib. Bell called 911 to report the child missing after finding nothing but Caliyah’s pajamas on the bathroom floor. Caliyah’s body was discovered a day later in a wooded area close by their home.
The Newton County jury found Bell guilty of charges of murder in the second degree, cruelty to children in the second degree and felony contributing to the dependency of a minor. But the Georgia Court of Appeals reversed the convictions for murder and cruelty to children, concluding the evidence was insufficient. The appellate court did uphold the third conviction, however, concluding that although Bell’s “acts of neglect were not the sole proximate cause of the victim’s death, the evidence played a substantial part in [the victim’s] death and that death was a reasonably probable consequence of that neglect.”
The court supported its conclusion with the evidence of Bell’s drug use, as well as evidence that McNabb had hit Bell before and after Caliyah’s birth.
The Supreme Court heard the case in April and issued its ruling Tuesday, overturning Bell’s last conviction, arguing that Bell’s failure to provide proper parental care, as alleged by the state, did not provide the jury with enough evidence to conclude that was the proximate cause of Caliyah's death.
The court also ruled that Bell’s choice to continue to live with McNabb, despite his violence, was not enough evidence to conclude that Caliyah’s death was foreseeable by Bell.
“In summary, the evidence here showed that Bell went to sleep one night, checked on Caliyah early the next morning, and went back to sleep for 4.5 hours. The evidence further showed that while Bell slept, McNabb committed a violent crime that the State conceded was the direct and immediate cause of Caliyah’s death,” Justice Ellington writes. “There was no evidence that Caliyah’s death was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of Bell’s drug use or drug use in the home by McNabb or others or that it was reasonably foreseeable that McNabb would commit the horrific crimes that resulted in Caliyah’s death. And there was no evidence presented that showed Bell was a party to McNabb’s crimes, that she heard McNabb striking Caliyah and did nothing to stop him, or that she refused to provide Caliyah with potentially lifesaving medical treatment.”
Bell was represented by Monroe attorney Eric Crawford, of the local firm Crawford and Boyle. The state was represented by Randy McGinley, district attorney for the Alcovy Judicial Circuit.
