Mom Intentionally Drives Into River with Kids in the Car, Killing 5-Year-Old Daughter: Prosecutors
Prosecutors believe a Missouri mom intentionally tried to murder her 5-year-old daughter and 1-year-old son by driving her car into a Kansas river on Friday while both kids were inside — killing the older child.
Documents obtained by PEOPLE accuse Scharron Renea Dingledine, 26, of Columbia, in the death of daughter Amiyah Bradley, whose body was pulled from the Kansas River in Lawrence, Kansas, on Saturday.
Dingledine and her son both were rescued at the scene, although the boy suffered critical injuries and remains hospitalized, Lawrence police said in a news release.
On Monday Dingledine was charged with murder and attempted murder, a statement obtained by PEOPLE from the Douglas County District Attorney’s Office confirms.
Clinton Bradley, the girl’s father, wrote on a GoFundMe page seeking help with funeral expenses that his daughter “was tragically killed as a victim of her mother intentionally driving a vehicle into the Kansas River.”
Dingledine suffered from depression, which contributed to Bradley’s separation from her, Bradley told the Lawrence Journal-World. He said he had not seen Amiyah for about a year and a half, at the request of Dingledine, who had moved in with her son’s father in Columbia.
Bradley said he wished he had taken “some kind of action to get custody” of his daughter after his growing concerns about Dingledine’s mental health, according to the outlet. (PEOPLE could not reach him independently.)
The boy’s father, Kaleb Lake, told the newspaper that his son was in intensive care on Monday in a Kansas City-area hospital, breathing on his own but with an uncertain prognosis.
“It’s just little by little,” he said. “Only time will tell.”
Lake, whom PEOPLE could not locate, declined to further discuss Dingledine or the deadly incident last week.
Police said emergency responders were called to the south bank of the Kansas River in Lawrence about 1:15 p.m. Friday and pulled Dingledrine and the boy from the water. They initially learned that a third occupant may have been inside the vehicle, but when it was recovered from the river, no other person was inside.
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“Due to diminishing and unsafe light conditions,” police say the water search was halted and resumed on Saturday morning, when Amiyah’s body was located. Police arrested Dingledine on Saturday afternoon on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.
She has not yet entered a formal plea and is being held in the Douglas County Jail after District Attorney Charles Branson requested a $1 million bond in the case.
“It appears Ms. Dingledine is a danger to herself and others in the public,” Branson said in court, reports the Journal-World. He said it did not appear that Dingleddine had any ties to the area where she drove into the river.
Asked by Judge James George whether she understood the charges against her, Dingledine nodded in court and said, “Yes, your honor,” the newspaper reports.
Carol Cline, the appointed attorney for Dingledine, could not be reached by PEOPLE to speak on her behalf. Dingledine is due back in court Tuesday.
