Prosecutors: Pair who fatally starved toddler should be executed

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 stayat-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.

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.