A grieving Missouri mother has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against a local day care, claiming a staff member suffocated her 3-year-old son in an attempt to make him sleep—and left him on the floor for hours until she discovered his lifeless body.
Tara Williams, the mother of Conrad Ashcraft, alleges that her son died on May 16 at Poppy’s Playhouse in Park Hills after an employee used their legs or feet to apply pressure to his chest or abdomen to force him to sleep. The day care is owned by Park Hills Ward 2 Councilwoman Spring Gray, who resigned from her post on Tuesday. The employee accused of the fatal act is not named in the lawsuit.
Filed Monday in St. Francois County, the lawsuit claims the facility not only permitted but approved the controversial technique. It further accuses the day care of failing to properly train or supervise its staff to ensure safe treatment of children in their care.
According to the complaint, the day care’s negligence included:
- Using physical force—specifically lower body pressure on the child’s torso—to subdue him during nap time
- Failing to supervise staff adequately to prevent harm
- Endorsing dangerous restraint methods that could cause fatal injury
The suit also alleges that staff did not notice Conrad’s distress—or even his death—and left him unattended on the floor for hours.
“On information and belief, [Conrad] was killed and remained laying on the floor of Defendant’s facility for hours without any effort to determine his wellbeing,” the lawsuit states.
In an interview with NBC affiliate KSDK, Conrad’s aunt, Lacey Hardie, said her nephew was nonverbal and had autism. She described it as a “nightmare” to think he was in pain and unable to cry out for help.
Hardie explained that nap time began at 12:30 p.m. and that Conrad’s mother arrived at around 4:15 p.m.—only to find her son still on the floor, unresponsive and already deceased.
As of Thursday afternoon, no criminal charges had been filed in connection to Conrad’s death, and Poppy’s Playhouse has not issued a public statement.
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