A former friend of a woman accused of murdering her daughter has revealed the horrific warning signs she saw in the months before the toddler was found dead in a playhouse.
Katelyn Carter took the stand at Megan Boswell’s murder trial this week, recounting how she went to Chili’s with the young mother and her 15-month-old daughter, Evelyn, in early December 2019.
‘She was dirty and I could smell her across the table,’ Carter said of the toddler, claiming her face, hands and clothes were all soiled.
A few weeks later, Carter said Boswell, who was just 18 at the time, started dating Hunter Wood – and spending more time with him than with her daughter.
When Carter eventually asked where Evelyn was, she said Boswell told her she was with her father, whom she claimed was Ethan Perry.
Boswell allegedly said Perry had returned home from an Army base in Louisiana and received emergency custody of the young girl after he saw a photo of her with a bruise.
But he did not actually have custody of the child.
At that point, prosecutors say Boswell changed her story to claim her mother took her daughter to a campground in Virginia – but authorities found no sign of Evelyn there either.
Evelyn Boswell’s remains were found in March 2020, months after her family said the 15 month old had gone missing
Evelyn’s mother, Megan Boswell, now 23, is facing trial for her murder
Finally, on February 18, 2020, Boswell reported her child missing.
The following month, her father suggested Tennessee Bureau of Investigation agents search a playhouse on his property in Blountville, Tennessee, where authorities found Evelyn’s remains inside a trash can.
Agent Brian Fraley, who found Evelyn’s body, explained in court that he searched a playhouse and found a trash can with two trash bags lying next to it, WJHL reports.
He said the trash bags looked like they had recently been placed there, as the jurors were shown gruesome images of the site.
The last photo, he said, showed the leg of a baby inside a trash can, wearing what he said matched the description Boswell released of Evelyn’s body.
Several photos also reportedly showed Evelyn in a state of partial decay among the trash, as her body was removed from the trash can.
Other clothing, diapers and toys that would have belonged to the child were also found on the property.
But Boswell has pleaded not guilty to the toddler’s murder, instead suggesting Evelyn died while she was co-sleeping with her.
Investigators worked tirelessly for weeks to locate the missing toddler, as Boswell reportedly changed her story
Her defense attorney, Gene Scott, asked jurors in his opening statement to consider all of the possibilities of what may have happened to Evelyn – including that her death may have been an accident.
He also implored the jury to put themselves in Boswell’s shoes – as an 18-year-old mother who had just lost a child and may have feared being charged with wrongdoing if she reported an accidental death.
The attorney admitted Boswell ‘absolutely lied to the police’ but did not kill her child.
‘She doesn’t want to get in trouble, it doesn’t mean she murdered her child,’ the attorney said in his opening remarks last week.
He went on to question why only Boswell had been the focus of the state’s investigation and why people like Wood, who had schizophrenia, was not also implicated.
Scott also said it ‘seems strange’ that Boswell’s father ‘had an epiphany’ as to where to search for Evelyn on his property, after it had already been thoroughly searched before.
In court, jurors were shown images from the scene where Evelyn’s body was found
Other clothing, diapers and toys that would have belonged to the child were also found on the property
Still, Scott called the gruesome disposal of Evelyn’s body ‘inexcusable’.
‘It doesn’t excuse anything. It doesn’t make it right, but it doesn’t mean she’s a murderer,’ he argued.
‘There’s nothing you all are gonna do that’s gonna change anything for Evelyn. Not a thing. That child is gone,’ Scott concluded
‘Your job here today and in the coming days and weeks will be to decide if Megan’s actions are criminal or whether they’re not criminal.’
But Prosecutor Amber Massengill argued that the state will prove that Boswell killed her daughter by suffocating her, then placed her body in a trash can.
She claimed the young mother made up stories and excuses to Evelyn’s pediatrician while she was missing, and started dating a new man amid the search.
She even allegedly went on a trips to Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge, and moved in with her new boyfriend as the search efforts continued.
Prosecutor Amber Massengill argued that the state will prove that Boswell killed her daughter by suffocating her, then placed her body in a trash can
‘I submit to you that Megan Boswell has already had her chance,’ the prosecutor told the jury.
‘She was gifted with a beautiful child. A healthy, vibrant little girl. Evelyn was perfect.
‘Megan Boswell already had her chance. Today is Evelyn’s chance. Today is our chance to get it right, not Megan’s.’
She went on to argue that ‘Evelyn did not have to die,’ Newsweek reports.
‘Evelyn could be here today,’ Massengill said. ‘And so today, five years later, we are asking you to give justice to Evelyn Boswell.’
As she spoke, Boswell and some of the other jurors were seen crying.
She is now facing two counts of felony murder; one count each of aggravated child abuse, aggravated child neglect, tampering with evidence, abuse of a corpse and failure to report a death under suspicious, unusual or unnatural circumstances; as well as the 12 counts of false reports.
If convicted, she faces life in prison without the possibility of parole.
