Mom Who Fatally Stabbed Her 4 Kids Learns Fate

Shanynthia Gardner sentenced in 2016 slayings
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Feb 9, 2022 2:19 AM CST
Mother Who Fatally Stabbed Her 4 Kids Gets Life
This 2016 arrest photo provided by the Shelby County Sheriff's Office shows Shanynthia Gardner of Memphis, Tenn. Gardner is charged with fatally stabbing her four children in an apartment and is scheduled to appear before a judge by video for an arraignment Tuesday, July 5, 2016.   (Shelby County Sheriff's Office via AP)

A Tennessee woman convicted of stabbing her four children to death was sentenced to life in prison Tuesday, the AP reports. Criminal Court Judge James Lammey Jr. found Shanynthia Gardner, 34, guilty last month of the 2016 slayings of the children, ages 4, 3, 2 and 5 months. Another child, who was 7 at the time, escaped to a neighbor’s home for help, the Shelby County district attorney’s office said. Gardner's lawyers argued an insanity defense, but the judge rejected it. Prosecutors agreed she has a mental disease but said she understood the wrongfulness of her actions, the district attorney's office said.

She was found guilty of four counts each of premeditated first-degree murder, aggravated child abuse, murder in the perpetration of aggravated child abuse, aggravated child neglect involving a deadly weapon, and murder in the perpetration of aggravated child neglect involving a deadly weapon. Lammey sentenced Gardner to life on each murder count and to 15 years on each of the other counts, to run concurrently. The children's father reportedly told authorities Gardner had been struggling in the weeks leading up to the murders, Law & Crime reports. He said she thought "someone is trying to harm her and her family."

(More Tennessee stories.)

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