Prosecutors detail how they say Savage day care worker suffocated one child, harmed another

A teenager has been charged with suffocating a nearly 1-year-old boy and harming a younger baby last year at a day care center where she worked in Savage.

Theah Loudemia Russell, 18, of Savage was charged on Thursday, Jan. 15, with second-degree murder, first-degree assault and third-degree assault in connection with the suffocation of Harvey Gene Muklebust, who died Sept. 22, and the similar injuring of a 5-month-old old girl.

Russell remained jailed this week in lieu of $3.5 million bail ahead of a Feb. 4 hearing in Scott County District Court. The Minnesota Star Tribune has reached out to her attorney for a response to the allegations.

State authorities suspended the license for Rocking Horse Ranch after Harvey’s death.

Two licensing review visits by the state’s Department of Human Services to the day care last year found 11 violations, including bathrooms that had not been cleaned, a lack of personal hygiene products for children and hazardous objects left within children’s reach. All of the problems were later corrected to the department’s satisfaction.

Police said this week that there is no criminal investigation of the day care or its owners.

According to the criminal complaint and police:

An officer near the center quickly arrived and found a day care worker holding Harvey. The boy was white in color with bluing around his mouth. The officer could not find a pulse and started CPR until fire personnel and other officers arrived to continue lifesaving efforts.

Paramedics took the infant to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after 11:30 a.m. As of late Thursday afternoon, autopsy results from the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s Office were still pending.

Officers back at the day care learned from staff of an incident on Sept. 19 involving a 5-month-old girl who had stopped breathing momentarily but regained her breath before paramedics arrived.

The officers learned the girl was back at the day care on Sept. 22 and soon vomiting up bloody mucus. Her family picked her up and had her hospitalized.

A doctor at Masonic Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis told an officer that “she was concerned about asphyxiation or an obstructed airway.” The doctor said the infant had stopped breathing for 30 to 60 seconds.

The 5-month-old was screaming when Russell picked her up to burp her at about 2 p.m. Sept. 19. Russell saw blood and that the child was turning blue. She called 911 nearly a half-hour later.

On Sept. 22, Harvey was fed by Russell and a fellow staffer. About 8:13 a.m., the staffer sent a photo of the 5-month-old girl’s vomit to her mother, who was also told about the girl vomiting three times and having bloody mucus around her mouth. The mother soon picked up the girl from the day care.

That same morning, Russell warmed up a bottle for Harvey, who was fed between 8:30 and 9 a.m. Russell and the other staffer put him down for a nap about 9:30 a.m. Russell returned about 10 minutes later to find the boy not fully asleep. She patted him on the back, and he dozed off.

A third staff member covered for Russell, who went on a break. Russell told the staff member that she had heard Harvey wake up or cry and needed to be checked on. The staff member picked up Harvey, “who appears blue and nonresponsive,” the complaint read. Russell called 911.

On Sept. 24, police and a special agent with the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension questioned Russell. She “had a difficult time with the chronology” of events on those two days, and there were discrepancies in her accounts of what happened on both, the complaint continued, but she denied harming either child.

A detective saw that Russell “did not cry, did not ask questions about the investigation, appeared clear-headed and did not ask about the reopening of the daycare,” the charges continued.

On Jan. 13, Russell was arrested. In a follow-up interview with police, she eventually admitted, “I choked him, and he stopped breathing,” the complaint quoted her as saying. She admitted putting her fingers down the children’s throats in all three incidents.

The complaint offered no explanation for why Russell picked out these two children to harm. Police said this week that she was trying to seek attention.

From investigators’ interviews with people who know Russell, she was found to have a “documented history of attention-seeking behavior,” Savage Police Chief Brady Juell said at a news conference called earlier in the week to announce Russell’s arrest.

For example, the chief said, she would make 911 calls and report nonsensical incidents and then hang up. In the past, she was also involved in incidents related to starting fires at a church camp and erratic behavior toward other children, Juell said.