A Utah woman and her husband allegedly put makeup on their young daughter’s dead body, apparently in a misguided attempt to try to hide the abuse she’d suffered at their hands.
As WLS (Chicago) reports , Brenda Emile, 22, and Miller Costello, 25, have been arrested and charged with aggravated murder for the death of three-year-old Angelina. This charge carries the possibility of the death penalty.
Police were called to the family’s home in Ogden, Utah on January 6, and told she wasn’t breathing. There, cops found the severely malnourished girl covered in burns, bruises, and cuts, some of which here healed or healing, but others were new.
The girl’s mom allegedly admitted to attempting to cover up the wounds with makeup “so they didn’t look as bad.”
Searching the parents’ cell phones and mobile devices revealed a horrifying pattern of abuse and neglect lasting at least a year and a half , says KIFI-TV (Idaho Falls). Several photos and videos showed the parents beating her, or the aftermath of her injuries. In one video, a male, allegedly Costello, can be seen manipulating an infant’s feet to make it look like the infant was kicking Angelina in the face. In other videos, the parents can be seen offering the starving girl food, only to take it away from her at the last second and record her screams. Sometimes those incidents would be accompanied by beatings, which the parents would record.
Ogden Police have arrested Miller Costello, 25, & Brenda Emile, 22, for child abuse homicide of their 3-year-old daughter Angelina Costello pic.twitter.com/11OoUcZwhs
— KSL Newsradio (@kslnewsradio) July 7, 2017
Two other children were taken from the home and placed into state custody. It is not clear if they showed signs of abuse or neglect as well.
Police say Costello admitted to being aware that Angelina was in danger, but he didn’t do anything about it on Brenda’s insistence because she didn’t want to endure an investigation and risk having the kids taken away.
Authorities are requesting that the pair is held without bail because they are both flight risks. Costello is known to have contacts in rural areas throughout the region that may help him hide from authorities. What’s more, the parents have connections to a traveling Gypsy community and allegedly had thousands of dollars of cash in the home.
[Featured Image by zoka74/Thinkstock]
