Background: News footage of Nichole Lea Scott in the courtroom for sentencing (KSL). Inset: Gavin Peterson (GoFundMe).
A Utah woman who pleaded guilty to the first-degree murder of her 12-year-old stepson faced a judge to hear her sentence.
Nicole Lea Scott, age 50, admitted guilt to the first-degree murder charge of 12-year-old Gavin Peterson, who succumbed to sepsis, malnutrition, and additional ailments in July 2024. Initially claiming innocence, Scott altered her plea following guilty admissions by the boy’s father, Shane Peterson, 47, and older brother, Tyler Peterson, 22, regarding Gavin’s death.
Scott’s authorized mistreatment of her stepson was outlined by prosecutors during a court session on Monday as she anticipated sentencing from 2nd District Court Judge Camille Neider. According to coverage by KSL, an NBC affiliate present in the courtroom, Neider addressed Scott by saying, “There are times people sit in that chair and I wish to, as they proceed to prison, express, ‘Do your best, at some point, you might be released’ — a semblance of hope, a flicker of possibility for them to cling to while incarcerated. Truthfully, I cannot be that glimmer of hope for you. I am uncertain if you will ever get out, and candidly, I hope that you do not.”
The judge sentenced Scott to up to a lifetime behind bars.
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Although Scott evaded a trial through her plea deal, she remained while prosecutors recounted the gruesome abuse Gavin Peterson suffered at the hands of his family, particularly from his stepmother. Prosecutors revealed that Gavin was confined to a stark room with no carpet, confined to a small area demarcated by blue tape measuring less than three feet each way. Surveillance cameras monitored him constantly, and he was required to wear a diaper due to restrictions on leaving the room.
The Salt Lake Tribune reported on charging documents that described some of the security footage of Gavin Peterson, including him “curling up on the carpetless floor” without any bedding or blankets, often with a “saturated diaper.” He was fed 1/2 a glass of water a day with a piece of bread with mustard, if he was fed at all.
In the memorandum read aloud in court, prosecutors said Gavin Peterson was subjected to “nothing short of a prolonged death camp” while in the home.
Prosecutors said that while care and love were showed towards other children in the home, “The only images or videos of Gavin were of him locked in the cell, laying in a dirty diaper, covered in feces and wounds. The only text messages regarding Gavin were of how much [Scott] hated him, how terrible he was, and the torture she and the codefendants enjoyed putting him through.”
One such text was read in court. In a text message Scott exchanged with Shane Peterson in May 2023 after she was told by Gavin Peterson’s school nurse that his fingers were showing symptoms of an infection, Scott texted the boy’s father, “He does this [expletive] for attention and I [expletive] hate it and it makes me hate him more and more!”
Prosecutors said that at the time those messages were sent, Gavin Peterson was 11 years old. He was taken out of school following that incident, and less than a month later, “Nichole and Shane remov[ed] Gavin from the public eye for the last time.” School personnel had begun reported signs of abuse to the Utah Division of Child and Family Services — so the parents apparently made sure school personnel could no longer see him.
On the day Gavin Peterson died, July 9, 2024, prosecutors said that Scott “lied to the police regarding the events of that day,” and delayed getting help for the boy after finding him unresponsive. Court documents obtained by local Fox affiliate KSTU stated that when she called 911, she reported that her stepson had “been ill for several days, experiencing vomiting, and was now not breathing.”
In court, prosecutors said that upon finding Gavin Peterson in such a dire state, Scott first texted Shane Peterson to tell him his son wasn’t breathing. She also spoke on the phone with him for more than 11 minutes. Before calling 911, she and Tyler Peterson “hid surveillance cameras, removed other items from the room and removed and replaced the door knob in an effort to mislead the police and hide the abuse and isolation that had been happening in the home.”
Twenty-one minutes transpired between Scott finding Gavin Peterson and her calling 911.
The boy’s cause of death was reported to be complications from sepsis, with contributing factors including pneumonia, dehydration and untreated infections. His body had also shown signs of starvation and several other physical wounds.
Neider sentenced Scott to 15 years to life in prison for first-degree murder, two sentences of one to 15 years for second-degree aggravated child abuse charges, two sentences of one to 15 years for second-degree obstruction of justice charges, up to five years for third-degree child endangerment, and up to 364 days for the possession or use of a controlled substance, a misdemeanor.
As part of the plea agreement, the sentences are to be served consecutively.
