http://www.carlyelizabethsawyer.com/
The following information is taken from www.facebook.com/heartheircries originally used The Virginian-Pilot
6/14/09
Girl had been subject of custody fight, relative says
By Patrick Wilson
The Virginian-Pilot
© June 14, 2009
CHESAPEAKE
The grandfather of the 5-year-old girl killed in a case in which her father and stepmother were charged remembered her Saturday as a happy child with long, curly hair.
"She was just a beautiful little loving, fun child," said Robert Kimery of Zachary, La., the grandfather of Carly Sawyer. "Loved to laugh. Loved to play."
Revolving around Carly, however, was a custody battle between two families, said Kimery, whose daughter Jennifer is Carly's mother.
Carly died Thursday at Children's Hospital of The King's Daughters in Norfolk. A medical examiner determined that the cause was blunt-force trauma. Contributing factors included starvation, ligature restraint and medical neglect, police said.
Paramedics were called to her family's house in the 1400 block of Oliver Ave. in Chesapeake about 5 p.m. Wednesday for a report of an unresponsive child. On Friday evening, detectives arrested Carly's father, Joshua Sawyer, 24, and his wife, Brandy Sawyer, 21.
Joshua Sawyer was charged with second-degree murder and felony child neglect. Brandy Sawyer was charged with first-degree murder and felony child neglect.
Kimery said he and his daughter had little contact with Carly in the past 2-1/2 years after a court in Jacksonville, N.C., granted Joshua Sawyer custody of her.
Jennifer and Joshua Sawyer met and married in California when she was in the Air Force and he was in the Marines. They separated about three years ago and divorced after she was stationed in South Carolina and he was stationed in Jacksonville, with Carly, Kimery said.
Jennifer Kimery and a friend, on a visit to see Carly, took her back to Georgia where Jennifer was living. That upset Sawyer, Robert Kimery said.
She also filed a complaint of abuse against her ex-husband with Child Protective Services in North Carolina, he said.
Kimery said he and his wife were raising Carly in Louisiana to keep her away from Joshua Sawyer, until Sawyer got an order granting him temporary custody. "They had a court order for me to return her," Kimery said. "We took her back and he stated that we would never see her again." Kimery said he did not know Joshua and Brandy Sawyer had moved from North Carolina to Hampton Roads until his family learned Carly was in the hospital. Three neighbors of the Sawyers on Saturday said they rarely saw them. In addition to Carly, the couple has a younger daughter and also lived with a young daughter of Brandy Sawyer's.
The Sawyers are being held without bond at the Chesapeake jail, a jail spokeswoman said.
On her Facebook page, Brandy Sawyer complained recently of being depressed and stressed. In April, she wrote that she was 10 weeks pregnant and in another post said she "just wants to run away from life."
In May, she wrote that she was feeling "really down and depressed." She also wrote on Facebook and in a comment on the Web site of the Jacksonville Daily News about a criminal case involving her sister, Dana Leigh Browning. Browning, 19, was arrested in November in Onslow County, N.C., on charges of concealing the birth of a child, failure to report a death and obstruction of justice. She is accused of putting her dead newborn girl in a plastic bag, then putting the body in the garbage and not notifying anyone, the Jacksonville Daily News reported. A court hearing is scheduled for June 30. Sawyer also joined a Facebook cause called Stop Child Abuse. In her most recent post, at 12:10 a.m. Friday, she wrote: "Carly passed away. We need prayers, holding onto nothing I feel like." A man who answered the phone at her mother's house in North Carolina on Saturday said her mother was not home and asked that a reporter not call back.
Joshua Sawyer's father, David K. Sawyer of New York, declined to comment when reached Saturday.
6/15/09
Chesapeake man, wife arraigned in death of 5-year-old girl
By Alicia P.Q. Wittmeyer
The Virginian-Pilot
© June 15, 2009
CHESAPEAKE
The father and stepmother accused of killing their 5-year-old daughter made their first court appearance this morning. Joshua and Brandy Sawyer were arraigned at 8:30 a.m. in Chesapeake Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court. The Sawyers are accused in the death of Carly Sawyer, who died Thursday at Children’s Hospital of The King’s Daughters in Norfolk. They are being held without bond. A medical examiner determined the cause of death was blunt-force trauma; contributing factors include starvation, ligature restraint and medical neglect, police said.
Joshua Sawyer is charged with second-degree murder and felony child neglect. Brandy Sawyer is charged with first-degree murder and felony child neglect. Both have bond hearings set for later this week.
A relative said during the weekend that the girl had been the subject of a custody fight
6/16/099
Parents fought for custody of Chesapeake girl who died
By Alicia P.Q. Wittmeyer
Mike Saewitz
The Virginian-Pilot
© June 16, 2009
CHESAPEAKE
The father and stepmother accused of killing their 5-year-old daughter stood before a judge for the first time Monday morning. Joshua Sawyer, 24, and Brandy Sawyer, 21, were arraigned in Chesapeake Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court at 8:30 a.m. The pair are being held without bond but have bond hearings scheduled later this week.
Joshua Sawyer is charged with second-degree murder and felony child neglect. Brandy Sawyer is charged with first-degree murder and felony child neglect. Court records revealed further details Monday about a custody dispute between Joshua Sawyer and his ex-wife, Jennifer Kimery, that preceded Carly's death on Thursday. The fight started when Carly was 2 years old and involved at least one child neglect complaint against the girl's mother.
Joshua Sawyer and Jennifer Kimery were married Nov. 27, 2003, court records show. They were both 19. Carly was born about two months later, on Jan. 24, 2004. Sawyer, who was a Marine corporal, was in Iraq when he learned of a October 2005 social services investigation stemming from a child neglect complaint against Kimery, according to a custody complaint he filed in Onslow County, N.C.
Records of the complaint were not available - a spokeswoman for the North Carolina Division of Social Services would not comment on whether the agency had any cases involving Carly's family. Kimery, who was in the Air Force, said in an interview that a complaint was filed by a supervisor who, while helping Kimery move, noticed a knife in a roommate's bathroom and adult videos in her bedroom - areas Carly didn't have access to, Kimery said.
The Onslow County Department of Social Services terminated its investigation after Sawyer's parents got involved in Carly's care, according to the custody complaint. Problems continued after Sawyer got back from Iraq in March 2006. After his return, Kimery said, the marriage went downhill. She decided to leave her home for Georgia, where she had friends. She left Carly with Sawyer, she said, because she would be sleeping on a couch and didn't want to bring her child down until she got settled.
Sawyer's custody complaint says Kimery abandoned the family, leaving home for at least a week in March and leaving for Georgia to live with her boyfriend, the complaint alleges. The problems peaked in July 2006, when Sawyer accused Kimery of returning to North Carolina and using "subterfuge" to gain control of Carly and take the girl to her parents' home in Louisiana, according to the complaint.
Kimery said Monday that she took Carly back to her family because she believed her daughter wasn't being cared for properly and feared for her safety. She says she filed a complaint of abuse against Sawyer with Child Protective Services in North Carolina. Sawyer filed the custody complaint days after Kimery took Carly. A judge granted him temporary custody that year and ordered Kimery to return the child.
Joshua Sawyer and Jennifer Kimery were divorced on June 13, 2007 - when Carly was 3 years old. Kimery said this week that she wishes people had listened when she said she was concerned for Carly's safety. "Somebody could have stopped this happening," she said. "They didn't listen. They let my Carly down."
Sawyer, a data network specialist, left the Marine Corps in June 2008, military records show. He was last stationed at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. He was awarded several medals, including the Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal and Iraq Campaign Medal.
Carly died Thursday at Children's Hospital of The King's Daughters in Norfolk. The cause of her death was blunt-force trauma; contributing factors include starvation, ligature restraint, and medical neglect, police said.
Social services officials in Chesapeake did not comment on whether they had been involved with Carly's family before her death. Chesapeake Social Services officials get calls or letters from social service agencies in other states - but only if child abuse or neglect cases are founded or substantiated and only if the agency knows that a family has moved.
Joshua and Brandy Sawyer's neighbors on Oliver Avenue said they didn't know much about the new family that had moved in a few months ago. They said the couple never talked to anyone, although when they first moved in, Carly and the family's two other children would play outside, riding bikes in the driveway, said Tamara Givens, who lives a few doors down. Carly would usually wave. But Givens said she hadn't seen the children outside in a while, and she hadn't met Joshua or Brandy Sawyer in the five or six months they lived there. "The first time I saw her was when she was sitting in back of the police car," Givens said.
6/17/09
Chesapeake girl kept in box, denied food, warrants say
By Alicia P.Q. Wittmeyer
The Virginian-Pilot
© June 17, 2009
CHESAPEAKE
In the last months of her life, Carly Sawyer was put into a cardboard box as punishment. Sometimes she was tied up with mesh netting. Other times, her father, Joshua Sawyer, and stepmother, Brandy Sawyer, withheld food, or spanked her with a belt. Chesapeake police filed search warrants Tuesday that provided new details about the murder cases against Carly's father and stepmother. The affidavit for the warrant - which police use to convince a magistrate that they have probable cause to search private property - notes that Joshua gave a statement to police.
In the last days of her life, Carly arrived at a hospital with cuts, bruises and burns on her body and ligature marks on her wrists. She was unconscious, and further examination revealed she had no brain activity, police have said. The 5-year-old died Thursday. A day later, police charged Joshua Sawyer, 24, with second-degree murder and felony child neglect. Brandy Sawyer, 21, is charged with first-degree murder and felony child neglect.
Joshua Sawyer is scheduled to have a bond hearing this morning, a bond hearing for his wife is scheduled for Friday. According to police, last Wednesday, one of the Sawyers called 911 after Carly became unconscious. It's not clear who called - there are two search warrants, and one says it was Brandy. The other says it was Joshua.
When medics arrived, they thought Carly's cuts and bruises looked suspicious and requested that police investigate, the warrants show. The Sawyers told police that Brandy Sawyer had spanked Carly, and the girl had thrown herself to the floor. Later, Joshua Sawyer admitted to "using netting material as restraints, restricting the child to a cardboard box as a form of discipline, withholding food and spankings," according to the warrant.
Handwritten, a detective added "with a belt" with his signature next to it. "We knew that it was something to this effect," said Carly's grandfather, Robert Kimery, whose daughter Jennifer is Carly's biological mother. "We just didn't know to the extent." The medical examiner who looked at Carly determined the cause of her death was blunt-force trauma, although contributing factors included starvation, ligature restraint and medical neglect.
"Starvation doesn't just come in a matter of a week or more," Kimery said. "They've both done something to do this to her. It's not just a one-time incident." Police seized two cardboard boxes, one bloody paper towel, a roll of blue mesh, a digital video camera, two insurance documents for Carly, nine photos of the girl, and a black leather belt from the two-story home that the Sawyers were leasing on Oliver Avenue, according to the warrant.
Police also searched for computers and computer equipment, although none are listed among the items seized. According to the warrant, police found Brandy Sawyer's page on the social-networking site Facebook, on which she refers to an e-mail account she used to send messages to her friends "about how stressed she was over the children."
On her Facebook page, Brandy Sawyer wrote multiple times about being depressed. Feeling "really down and depressed," she wrote May 14. On April 24, she wrote "I give up omg I just give up." The page also includes multiple photo albums with pictures of her children - Carly and two other girls. There are pictures of Carly picking flowers, riding a bike and holding her baby sister. One is from Halloween, another from Christmas. One is titled "Pics of my angels."
Joshua Sawyer's lawyer said he could not comment Tuesday. Brandy Sawyer's lawyer did not return a phone call.
6/18/09, 5:00 AM EDT
Man accused in child's death denied bond
Chesapeake man, wife arraigned in death of 5-year-old girl
CHESAPEAKE, Va. (AP) -- A judge has denied bond for a Chesapeake man accused of killing his 5-year-old daughter. Joshua Sawyer is charged with second-degree murder. The child's stepmother, Brandy Sawyer, is charged with first-degree murder. Her bond hearing is Friday.
Authorities say Carly Sawyer was confined in a box, tied up, hit with a belt and denied food. Paramedics summoned to the home June 10 found Carly with cuts, bruises and burns on her body and ligature marks on her wrists. She died the next day. A defense attorney told a judge Wednesday that 24-year-old Joshua Sawyer should be released on bond because he was a Marine veteran with no criminal record. But a prosecutor opposed Sawyer's release, citing "systematic abuse" of the child.
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