A 41-year-old woman was arrested after police found her 19-year-old daughter dead inside a feces-covered, padded room at a home in Richmond, Indiana, authorities said.
Officers were called to the South 10th Street residence on July 24, where they discovered Caleigh Lindsay inside a small, stall-like room with a partially attached diaper and about a dozen soiled diapers nearby, according to police reports. An autopsy listed a possible seizure related to Pitt-Hopkins syndrome as the cause of death.
Police said the room’s walls and door appeared to be smeared with feces and had holes in them; the holes were described as places where the mother told officers her daughter had struck her head during seizures. Caleigh Lindsay was described by investigators as nonverbal, wheelchair-bound and having multiple medical conditions, including microcephaly, mitochondrial disease, autism and epilepsy. Authorities said she had used a feeding tube since the age of 10.
The woman, identified by police as Liza Lindsay, told officers she last checked on her daughter around 10:45 p.m. the night before and that Caleigh experienced a seizure that lasted about a minute. Lindsay said she left the teen on her side and went to bed at about 11:15 p.m. The teen’s boyfriend, Darryl Grubbs, found her unresponsive the next morning, police said.
Investigators said the overall condition of the residence was deplorable. Officers reported a strong smell of cat urine, human feces and garbage, piles of trash in rooms and bathtubs, fly strips hanging from ceilings and visible black mold in the refrigerator. A child was found sleeping on a couch. The local health department later found ammonia levels in the home that were five times higher than normal, police said.
One surviving child told investigators the last meal they could recall was a "hot sauce sandwich" and could not say when that meal had been eaten. Relatives and acquaintances told authorities they had not seen Caleigh on some occasions in months or longer. An acquaintance also told investigators that Grubbs had been violent toward Lindsay and the children, the police account said.
Lindsay and Grubbs were each charged with preliminary counts of neglect of a dependent, according to police. The charges follow an investigation by Richmond police and health officials; the case remains under review and further legal steps have not been announced.
Lindsay told officers she had been struggling with depression and that she had been taken off medication earlier in the year, but police said they found no evidence in medical records to support a change in prescriptions. Authorities also reported a lack of fresh food in the residence.
Caleigh Lindsay’s obituary described her interests in K-pop, cartoons and playing with her brother, and said she enjoyed snuggling with family members. "She was everybody’s sunshine," it read.
Police and local officials did not immediately release additional information about the investigation, and court records did not show any completed adjudications at the time of the report. The family’s case has drawn attention from child welfare authorities and public health officials who continue to assess the circumstances surrounding the teen’s death and the living conditions observed at the home.