FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. _ Tayla Aleman's parents insisted she'd been eating. The girl's autopsy told an entirely different story.
Here was a 13-month-old who weighed only 7 pounds when she died _ about 2 pounds less than she did at birth.
On top of this "extreme developmental delay," Tayla also had the flu, pneumonia and several serious infections before she stopped breathing inside a rural Palm Beach County home.
The hospital emergency room doctor called it the worst case of starvation he'd ever seen. And the medical examiner said Tayla's death on April 1, 2016, was a homicide.
Investigators discovered the toddler had lived in a filthy, smelly, bug-infested house with hardly any food for the family's 10 children and a caged dog.
Prosecutors say Tayla, emaciated and unable to crawl, was neglected and physically abused until she died. They say her parents, Kristen Meyer and Alejandro "Alex" Aleman, intentionally killed her.
Two grand juries have indicted the mother and the father on first-degree murder and aggravated child abuse felony charges.
In a rare step, prosecutors insist the parents deserve the death penalty because the crimes against their own daughter were so awful. There will be separate trials.
Meyer, 46, is up first, with jury selection set to begin March 13. She plans to use an insanity defense.
But Aleman, 42, is putting the blame on his wife. He argues she was a stay-at-home mom responsible for feeding and caring for their daughter while he was out working.
There's still another charge against the couple _ a misdemeanor animal cruelty count over alleged "inhumane" treatment of their bulldog, Achilles.
Lawyers for Meyer and Aleman say the jury shouldn't consider the animal cruelty allegations at the same time, because "evidence of the dog's condition and treatment is not relevant" to Tayla's death.
Meyer's counsel also argued the jurors already will be asked to "put aside any natural revulsion they may feel" for a woman accused of deliberately killing her child. So adding a suffering dog to the mix will upset animal lovers on the panel, they reason.
Circuit Judge Cheryl Caracuzzo recently ruled the jury will hear all about the malnourished dog, because the issues are all related.
"The allegations happened in the same time frame in the same household while under the care of the same people," the judge explained. "If two children had died from lack of proper care, the cases would appropriately be tried together. The Court sees no difference that an animal who may have suffered from the same lack of nourishment and survived to be legally different ..."
Tayla Aleman was born in a Martin County hospital on March 7, 2015, after a full-term, 40-week pregnancy, records show. She weighed 8 pounds 15 ounces, without any apparent health concerns.
Three months later, Tayla moved with her sister, eight brothers and parents to a rented, one-story house on 30th Lane in Loxahatchee, just north of Lion Country Safari.
In response to complaints that the house was dirty and the children had "inadequate supervision," an investigator from the state Department of Children and Families showed up with a sheriff's deputy around late October that year for a surprise inspection.
But Aleman refused to let them in. "Mr. Aleman was upset and he told her he was tired of people calling DCF on him and he wanted her to obtain a warrant in order to give her access into his home," a report stated.
They returned in December 2015, with a court order and without a prior warning. Aleman then "apologized to them for the miscommunication" and opened the door.
"You guys didn't have to go through all this," Aleman told his visitors. "I would (have) let you see the kids."
The inspector found a "spotless" home and no obvious concerns about the physical condition of the children, ranging in age from the baby to 15.
"The children appeared clean, with no marks or bruises," the inspector said. "The baby was a skinny 7-month- old baby but not skinny to the point where the baby appeared as if she was not being fed."
The only oddity was that the kids didn't speak. "They all made grunting noises and weird sounds when they would respond to their questions," records show, noting that Meyer told the inspector "the children would grow out of it" and she "did not see anything wrong with her children's speech."
Meyer explained that she home-schools all the kids, while Aleman said he was a tow truck driver and a repo man.
The rooms appeared tidy, beds were made, and there were no unpleasant smells. It looked, the inspector said, "like a model house."
On the early evening of April 1, 2016, Aleman called his wife asking what was for dinner. Meyer later said she was trying to feed Tayla at that time, but the baby didn't want her bottle. She said she thought Tayla must have been full after a feeding a few hours earlier.
After Meyer hung up the call, she noticed the baby in her arms "appeared a little lethargic as if she was sleepy." Then she realized the baby wasn't breathing. She called Aleman back, and he told her to call 911. It was 6:30 p.m.
The 911 dispatcher walked Meyer through CPR instructions, until paramedics arrived and took the baby to nearby Palms West Hospital. But Tayla didn't have a pulse and she couldn't be saved.
A fire-rescue report notes that the baby's ribs were visible through her skin, and she appeared malnourished enough for the paramedics to ask the mom if the baby had cancer or another disease.
Medical experts say a normal weight for a girl that age is about 20 pounds.
Aleman refused to speak with investigators that night at the hospital, citing the advice of his lawyer. But Meyer, who was in another room, agreed to talk.
"Mrs. Meyer-Aleman told me (Tayla) was a perfectly healthy baby who was fine until this evening," Palm Beach County Sheriff's Detective Vionide Saint-Jean wrote in a report. "Mrs. Meyer-Aleman told me she cannot understand what happened because everything occurred so fast. She said one minute (Tayla) was fine and suddenly she just stopped breathing while in her arms and now she is dead."
At 6 a.m. the next day, law enforcement showed up with a court-ordered search warrant to examine the home.
DCF workers brought a van to take custody of the other nine children, over the objection of their parents.
"I observed the children had what appeared to be either bug bites all over their limbs or some sort of rash," Detective James Suarez wrote in a report. "They were all in a very deep sleep as if they were completely exhausted."
He added, "during this time I had to exit and re-enter the home as the smell was so overwhelming."
Detective Saint-Jean shared similar observations.
"Upon entering the home I was overwhelmed by a strong, pungent odor of urine and feces ... the house reeked so bad one can smell (it) from the far end of the driveway leading to the house ... once inside the house there were flies, gnats and what appeared to may have been fleas swarming the house."
He noted that the bedroom carpets were wet, sticky and stained black.
"The toilets were filled with unflushed (waste) and it appeared as though the toilet was not working," the detective wrote in another report. "Inside of the laundry room was a pile of clothes so high it was difficult to open the door."
They found one baby bottle and a half-filled container of baby formula powder. Tayla apparently had slept near her parents in a "dirty playpen that appeared to convert into a basinet."
Saint-Jean said the dog was found inside a rusted crate, filled with the animal's waste, about 3 inches thick, and two empty food bowls. A report from county animal inspectors said the dog's hip and ribs were visible, along with pressure sores, overgrown nails, and fur stained yellow and brown.
Aleman didn't object to Achilles' removal, telling officers he rescued the dog two weeks earlier from a homeless woman in Lake Worth because he wanted to help the underweight animal.
Kitchen trash cans were filled with dog poop, "which flies and fleas were hovering over," Saint-Jean wrote.
Investigators noted the kitchen had two refrigerators. One was empty. The other contained "a half-gallon of milk, another gallon of some unknown chunky liquid that appeared to be expired and rotten. There were very limited edible items for the children to eat. There were a couple cans of soup and some large-sized bottles of condiments such as ketchup and mustard and a half loaf of moldy bread."
There was a frozen pizza and two bags of frozen fries. The kitchen cabinets contained peanut butter, spices, canned soup, a box of macaroni and cheese, a pack of crackers, a box of pasta and condiments.
After Meyer and Aleman were arrested, then DCF Secretary Mike Carroll called Tayla's death "senseless and avoidable."
"In response to this case, we implemented mandatory additional training for all child protective investigators and supervisors in the region," he said in a statement.
Parents deny responsibility
After being booked in jail, Meyer and Aleman spoke separately to detectives. Both denied any responsibility for Tayla's demise.
"We all loved her, I treat all my kids the same way," Meyer said. "All this happened, and it threw my family into a turmoil. I mean, it's, it's broken my heart."
In between sobs, Meyer continued, "I don't think anyone understands what it's done to me. It's killed me inside."
Meyer mentioned how she had recently given birth to another baby _ she was pregnant when Tayla died.
Asked why Tayla weighed just 7 pounds, Meyer said, "I guess I never saw that. I knew she was small, but as the mother of 10 children, and now 11 ... I never had a problem feeding her ... she never not wanted the bottle ... in my mind I never thought I was doing anything wrong."
Aleman also repeatedly insisted that Tayla had been eating.
"I'm going to say it again: Tayla ate," Aleman said. "Right now, I'm being arrested for no reason. I did not commit this crime. ... I'm very confused about why I'm being charged with murder."
In the interview, the father gave credit to his wife, saying she's "always been a good mother, always there for the kids, does everything she can for the kids."
But Michael Salnick, the lawyer for Aleman, wants to keep Aleman's interview from the jury. In a request for the spouses to have separate trials, Salnick wrote Aleman "is pointing the finger at his Wife/Co-Defendant, stay-at-home mother and sole care giver of the child."
Aleman said he never carried the baby in his arms.
"I don't hold little kids," he said. "There's no law that I have to hold my daughter."
But a detective challenged him: "No, it's a law that you have to make sure she's eating and to check in on her and look. And when you see that she's not looking right and you see that she's not gaining weight, it is your responsibility and obligation to take her to the doctor."
Aleman replied: "My daughter ate. That's all I can tell you."
Preparing for Meyer's trial, her lawyers requested that the jury not hear most of her interview, including some statements and questions by the detectives.
They argue much of the commentary is "irrelevant and prejudicial," including a round of extensive questioning about unsanitary conditions inside the home.
"Ms. Meyer is not on trial for being a bad housekeeper," wrote Assistant Public Defender Stephen Arbuzow.
He said the detectives frequently inserted their own opinions, such as an observation that Tayla's skin was hanging off of her "like a chicken wing."
Salnick agrees his client's statements should be thrown out because of the detectives' "gratuitous comments," and it "simply records the defendant repeatedly professing his innocence."
Meyer's defense also doesn't want the jury to see videos and photos of the home as it appeared when the baby died, because it is "an attempt to cast a negative light on Ms. Meyer."
"The fact the home was odorous or hazardous does not tend to prove or disprove the material fact that (Tayla) was malnourished," Public Defender Carey Haughwout wrote last month.
The defense is not disputing that the baby didn't get enough food to live, so they are objecting to plans by prosecutors to call in five doctors to testify as a "needless waste of time."
The jury, they argue, must only decide "Ms. Meyer's culpability for the death."
To that end, the lawyers plan to present evidence that she was insane at the time. Because of her bipolar disorder, "she did not know what she did was wrong or the consequences of her actions or inactions," Haughwout told the court.
Assistant State Attorney Terri Skiles has outlined seven reasons in support of a death sentence for both parents, including arguments that the killing was "heinous, atrocious or cruel." Other factors are that the victim was "particularly vulnerable," and that the parents "knowingly created a great risk of death to many persons."
Meyer's lawyers have objected to all of the listed reasons, and blasted the claim that the mother put her entire brood in mortal danger.
"There is no evidence to indicate the other children were malnourished or abused," wrote Haughwout, "and no evidence ... has been produced to show any child suffered any great risk of death."
