After being placed in foster care, the 11-year-old allegedly told a caretaker that her mother had killed her two younger brothers in their Colorado apartment and forced her to cover for her.
According to an account provided in court by a London prosecutor and reported by the Associated Press, the 11-year-old, identified by her initials M.W., eventually told authorities that her mother, Kimberlee Singler, had instructed her children to drink powdered milk and close their eyes as she led them to a bedroom.
“The defendant told her that God was telling her to do it, and that the children’s father would take them away,” prosecutor Joel Smith told the Associated Press during the three-day extradition hearing last week.
Singler, 36, is charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of her 7-year-old son and 9-year-old daughter, as well as the alleged attempted murder of M.W., according to the Colorado Springs Police Department. She fled to the United Kingdom and was arrested in a London hotel on December 30.
Singler was also charged with child abuse and first-degree assault, according to a December press release from police.
She is also charged with additional counts of murder and attempted murder under Colorado law, which includes charges for such conduct against minors under the age of twelve.
Shortly after midnight on December 19, a 911 caller reported a burglary at the unit.
Singler and her 11-year-old daughter were both taken to the hospital with injuries, while the two younger children were discovered dead in the house, according to authorities.
According to investigators, the Colorado Springs Investigations Department Homicide Unit discovered that the first report of a burglary was false during the investigation.
According to the Associated Press, Smith stated at a Westminster Magistrates’ Court hearing last week that officers discovered 7-year-old Aden Wentz and 9-year-old Elianna “Ellie” Wentz in bed, both fatally shot and stabbed.
According to Smith, the 11-year-old was stabbed numerous times while pleading with her mother to spare her, and police initially identified Singler, who had superficial knife wounds, as a victim in the alleged burglary.
Smith told the London court that Singler attempted to shift blame to her ex-husband, Kevin Wentz, with whom she was at the time in a custody struggle, claiming that she suspected him of “killing them, or organizing to kill them.” She said that a ‘dark figure’ entered her apartment and caused her to faint. (A judge granted Wentz extra time with his children, and Smith claimed she disregarded an order to turn them up beginning December 16.)
However, Wentz’s alibi was validated by his truck’s GPS tracking device, and authorities claim that the blood on the weapons matched Singler and her children.
According to the Associated Press, the 11-year-old initially reported to authorities that a man broke into their home through the patio and attacked the family. She then told a caretaker that her mother had instructed her to lie to officers.
Singler’s defense counsel, Edward Fitzgerald, who previously defended Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in his lengthy extradition procedures, said in court, according to the Associated Press, that Singler had not harmed her children and believed authorities coerced the claim from her daughter.
Fitzgerald stated on Friday, September 6, that she should not be extradited to Colorado because she could face life without parole, a violation of European human rights legislation.
Fitzgerald also suggested that Colorado Governor Jared Polis was unlikely to shorten her sentence, stating that doing so would be “political suicide,” according to the Associated Press.
According to the Associated Press, Smith then stepped up in court and claimed that in 2018, former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper commuted six men’s first-degree murder sentences.
The hearing was deferred until December 2.
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