Police: Women Took Out Insurance Policy On Starved Boy

Grandmother, Aunt Charged In 4-Year-Old’s Death

JACKSON, Miss. -- Sheriff's investigators in Scott County Friday night were trying to learn more about 4-year-old Austin Watkins' starvation death.

Watkins was taken to a hospital about a year ago, police said, and detectives wonder if the claims that he was sick may have actually masked malnutrition.

The sheriff said on Friday that he's looking over 16 WAPT's stories, because some people to whom reporters talked may have known about the abuse and didn't report it.

An insurance policy worth $10,000 was taken out on the boy, police said. The document was actually pinned to the wall of Watkins' room.

The insurance policy was free from Gerber Baby Foods but would've paid $10,000.

A lot of people are asking how this could've happened.

"It broke my heart," Scott County resident Loretta Herring said. "I have three grandbabies."

Many people were wondering how a 4-year-old child could starve to death and no one knew it was happening.

"It's horrible," resident Billy Frank Alford said. "I'm just sick to my stomach. In fact, it's the worst crime I have heard of."

Watkins weighed 19 pounds when he starved to death, police said. Investigators believe he had not eaten for about two weeks. The sheriff said investigators are looking into claims that Watkins may have been locked in a room and given only water, kept in a cage or tied up.

According to investigators, his aunt, Stephanie Bell, and his grandmother, Janice Mowdy, may have actually forced the child to eat whatever was left or crawling around on the floor of their trailer just to survive.

"No one was contacted here at the Scott County Sheriff's Department," said Scott County Sheriff Mike Lee.

Lee said no one called his office about claims of child abuse at the trailer in Lena.

Brenda Peterson is Janice Mowdy's sister. She said she wished she had called.

"They'd let the other children eat in front of him, make him stand in one place, let them eat and drink with him just starving to death with nothing to eat," Peterson said.

Lee said he's now reviewing 16 WAPT's interview with Peterson, as well as others.

"Anyone who did not call could be accountable," Lee said. "If someone had any knowledge about it, that this was going on, they should have called every day. They should have done anything they could to get law enforcement and DHS involved."

The Department of Human Services said it received one call in 2006, but an investigator inspected the home and found no reason to worry about Watkins and his three siblings.

"I cannot talk about this particular case, although I would love to," said DHS Deputy Director Lori Woodruff. "But what we do know is if DHS had received a call, such as this, in any county any time we would have immediately responded."

Investigators said they'll continue working on trying to make sense of the crime.

The three other siblings, ages 9, 6 and 2, are in foster care.

Mowdy and Bell have been charged with murder and felony child abuse, but those charges could be upgraded to capital murder -- that means both could face the death penalty.

Lee said both women have denied any wrongdoing.