Mom Drove Daughter to Nature Preserve — Then Allegedly Stabbed Girl in Face, Neck and Left Her in Brush to Die

A Florida female was arrested aft allegedly stabbing her 12-year-old girl and attempting to hide her assemblage while she was still alive. 

Gwendolyn Girard, 35, was arrested connected charges of aggravated artillery and kid maltreatment aft deputies located nan 12-year-old pinch cuts to her look and cervix connected May 26, according to a news merchandise from nan Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office.

Deputies opportunity nan kid was anemic and needed contiguous aesculapian attraction but earlier she was taken to a hospital, nan 12-year-old told deputies that Girard attacked her pinch a weapon and near her nether nan brushwood earlier leaving successful a gold-colored van, nan connection said. 

Members of nan adjacent Lee County Sheriff’s Office were capable to find nan van successful North Fort Myers pinch Girard astatine nan aforesaid location. According to their statement, nan van was towed and Girard was brought successful for questioning and arrested. 

Detectives past interviewed Girard, who allegedly confessed to nan stabbing and told them wherever authorities could find nan weapon utilized successful nan attack, their connection said.

“In my 33-year career, location are only a fistful of times that I person been near speechless. This is 1 of those times. To onslaught a kid pinch a knife… I can’t understand it,” Sheriff Bill Prummell said successful a statement. 

The 12-year-old woman was taken to a adjacent infirmary and treated for her wounds. According to nan sheriff’s office, she is successful unchangeable condition. 

Want to support up pinch nan latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLE's free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing proceedings sum and specifications of intriguing unsolved cases.

Girard is being held astatine a section jailhouse connected a $750,000 bond, pending extradition to nan Charlotte County Jail, nan connection said. The investigation remains unfastened and ongoing astatine this time. 

“It is only by God’s grace that she is still pinch america today, and I believe for her arsenic she heals from nan horrific incident," Prummell said. "Unfortunately, nan intelligence trauma inflicted connected her whitethorn ne'er heal."

If you fishy kid abuse, telephone nan Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline astatine 1-800-4-A-Child aliases 1-800-422-4453, aliases spell to www.childhelp.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is disposable 24/7 successful much than 170 languages.