Florida woman Tyshael Elise Martin has been charged with murder after allegedly ordering her 100-pound Rottweiler to attack a 9-year-old girl. The alleged Rottweiler attack, which occurred in June, was captured on the family’s security camera.
Florida investigators described a series of disturbing clips in a 10-page arrest affidavit obtained by People, showing Martin allegedly holding the dog’s leash and repeatedly ordering it to bite 9-year-old Jamaria Sessions as she lay prone on the floor.
Later in the videos, Martin allegedly kicked Jamaria to the floor, “grabbed the child by her hair,” and pulled her around while “repeatedly” striking her.
According to the affidavit, Martin said, “I’m fixin’ to kill her.”
The Lake County Sheriff’s Office reported that two days later, police arrested Jamaria’s father, LoJuan Sessions, and charged him with aggravated manslaughter of a child. Sessions told investigators that he and his girlfriend had argued on June 12, and he moved out the next day, leaving Jamaria with her. Four days after he moved out, someone called 911 to the home for an “unresponsive child, who was cold to the touch.”
When first responders arrived on
the scene, they found Jamaria naked and described her as having “a significant number of abrasions, small punctures, burns, possible bite marks, and bruising covering her body, all in various stages of healing.” Per the affidavit, she had a swollen face and several broken teeth. She was pronounced dead at the scene.The medical examiner ultimately ruled her death as a homicide and explained that it was caused by “complications of multiple blunt injuries of head, torso, and extremities and thermal injury of right foot,” but overall, many of the injuries were consistent with extended physical abuse.
Although Sessions’s first court appearance was on Aug. 31, Martin has already appeared before a Lake County judge and refrained from entering a plea.
Officers executed a search warrant on the home, leading to the arrests of Sessions and Martin after they found video footage of Jamaria being attacked by the family’s 103-pound Rottweiler on June 15, with Martin encouraging the attack.
Jamaria had lived in Sessions and Martin’s household since October 2023, before her death.
This is not the first time the couple has been in trouble with the law. According to People
, they both have a criminal history of possession and dealing illegal narcotics and charges related to “exposing their children to dangerous situations.” Sessions spent five years in prison for drug trafficking, along with two counts of felony child neglect before the Rottweiler attack.RELATED CONTENT: 4-Year-Old Brutally Attacked By Pitbull; Parents Say Babysitter Saved Him