The grieving grandmother of one of the children from a Houston horror home said she should have adopted all the children — an autopsy revealed 8-year-old Kendrick Lee died of multiple blunt force injuries, according to a report Wednesday.
Linda Smith, 71 – Gwen Kirklin’s starving and neglected 7-year-old grandmother – was disgusted to learn that their mother, Gloria Williams, 35, had left the siblings in deplorable circumstances.
“I wish I knew how bad the situation these kids were in; I would have adopted all the kids,” Smith, 71, told the Daily Mail.
While her son and the boy’s father, Jonathan Kirklin, was behind bars in 2014, Smith said Williams and all of her children lived with her — before she eventually fired them.
“I soon found out that when my son was in prison and I was at work, Gloria had different men come to my house. I don’t know what she was doing with them. As soon as I found out I had confronted Gloria with him, of course she denied it. But I told her she and her children should they leave.
She added, “I regret kicking her out, I shouldn’t have done that. I asked myself, what else did these kids go through with all the men that went in and out of her life? Were the kids molested and abused?”
In the disturbing case, Ja’Veon and his siblings, Jordan Lee, 15, and Trevon Lee, 10, were found deserted on Sunday, along with the skeletal remains of 8-year-old Kendrick.
Williams was accused of neglecting her children while her boyfriend, Brian Coulter, 31, was arrested for the battered murder of young Kendrick.
After Williams left Smith’s house in 2014, she “disappeared” before reappearing with Javon a few years later, Williams said.
“Looking back now, I think if I had asked her, she would have let me adopt Ja’Veon,” Smith said.
Williams said she now feels obligated to take care of all the boys.
I will adopt them all. “I am so sad to hear what happened to them,” she said.
Authorities were alerted to the abuse Sunday after Jordan Lee called 911, prompting a welfare check.
Authorities said Coulter and Williams left Kendrick’s rotting body in a closet and left the other three children behind.
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