Two women have been sentenced to prison after pleading guilty cruelly abuse the young children in their care at Happy Hearts Christian Academy Nursery School in Alabama.
Kailey Gilley i Stomach boils were arrested and booked into Dale County Jail on multiple charges on October 10, 2024. Gilley was then charged with two counts of “willful torture/abuse” of a child who was not part of her family, and nine counts of “aggravated child abuse,” while Gilley faced four counts of “willful torture/abuse” and eight counts of “aggravated abuse.”
Under Alabama state law, the first charge is a Class C felony defined as “a responsible person who will torture, willfully abuse, mistreat, cruelly beat, or willfully ill-treat any minor under the age of 18, under conviction.” Aggravated child abuse is classified as a Class B felony.
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On Monday, January 5, relatives of the victims testified in court about the harmful behavior of Gilley and Koker. Witnesses claimed that some of the children who had been abused were too young to speak and could not tell anyone what they had been going through, according to reports from Wtvy. A boy, who has not been named publicly by authorities, was said to have received most of the abuse.
During the testimony, a mother also told the court that she saw video footage of the women altercation hitting her son. The boy then experienced bruising and swelling from the attacks and was taken to hospital. This led to the local police investigating the alleged abuse.
“Officers met with the child’s parents, who reported that the injuries were discovered after picking up the child from daycare,” Police Chief John Crawford said at the time. “The parents said the bruises weren’t there earlier that day.”
Other parents said their children are still emotionally scarred by the abuse, experience symptoms such as night terrors and struggle to feel comfortable in new daycare settings.
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Both Koker and Gilley took a “blind” plea deal, meaning there was no sentencing agreement arranged for the deal, and the judge William Filmore he ordered that each woman spend five years behind bars and an additional three years on probation. No woman shall be eligible for parole or early release.
The Happy Hearts Christian Academy daycare center has reportedly been closed since the arrests of Gilley and Koker.
The Alabama Department of Public Health reports that child abuse cases increased over a three-year period. In 2015, there were 8,466 victims of child abuse, and in 2018, the number grew tragically to 12,158. As of 2019, the total number of victims of child abuse was 10.7 per 1,000 children, with 3.1 fatalities per 100,000 children. However, in 2023, the numbers were down slightly from 2018 with Child welfare outcomes reporting that in Alabama there were 11,636 minors who were victims of abuse.
If you or someone you know is experiencing child abuse, call or text Helpline for children at 1-800-422-4453.