Arkansas Mother Pleads Responsible In Dying of Boy Who Drowned in Rest room and Was Discovered Underneath Floorboards

Ashley Rolland acquired a sentence of 40 years within the Arkansas Division of Corrections after pleading responsible on August 8 to 2 counts of allowing abuse of a minor, after her boyfriend fatally drowned her 5-year-old son in a bathroom as punishment and injured her 6-year-old daughter in 2022, State Police mentioned in a launch.

Based on an affidavit (by way of NBC) in December 2022, Lee County deputies responded to a house on Entrance Avenue, the place Rolland introduced out her daughter. The kid had obvious accidents on her head that had scabbed over. The mom claimed her son, Blu Rolland, was not on the residence.

The daughter was transported to Forrest Metropolis Hospital, the place employees decided she had been severely burned.

Based on the affidavit, Rolland’s mom informed deputies that Blu was presumably deceased contained in the defendant’s residence. That is when authorities entered the residence and located the boy beneath the floorboards, wrapped in layers of plastic luggage. He was discovered on December 16, 2022 — what would have been his sixth birthday.

Arkansas State Police introduced that, “primarily based on preliminary findings, it is believed the boy died from accidents sustained within the residence. Rolland reportedly informed police her son died three months earlier, on Sept. 9, 2022.

Based on the affidavit, Blu allegedly “angered her boyfriend, Nathan Bridges, by biting his finger when Bridges caught it in” his mouth. As punishment, Bridges reportedly drowned the kid in the bathroom.

Rolland admitted she had entered the lavatory, the place and noticed her son struggling to breathe, nothing that his physique appeared limp. She additionally informed investigators that it was Bridges who buried her son beneath the floorboards after his dying.

As for her daughter’s accidents, Rolland allegedly these have been additionally brought on by Bridges when he held the woman’s “head and higher torso beneath sizzling water within the bathtub.” Rolland’s daughter reportedly struggles with behavioral points, and Bridges would use sizzling water as punishment.

Based on state police, each Rolland and Bridges have been initially charged with capital homicide, abuse of a corpse, tampering with bodily proof and endangering the welfare of a minor.

Whereas Rolland was handed down a 40-year sentence, Bridges pleaded responsible in July to first-degree homicide and first-degree battery, and was sentenced to 60 years within the Arkansas Division of Corrections.