Background: The senior living facility in Norfolk, Va., where Cleo Loizides died in 2024 (Google Maps). Inset: Heather Cummings (Norfolk City Jail).
A woman who traveled with her son to a senior living facility in Virginia so she could kill her own mother has been sentenced to 40 years in prison.
On Friday, Heather Cummings, aged 53, was sentenced after admitting guilt to the second-degree murder of her 81-year-old mother, Cleo Loizides. Heather Cummings accepted her involvement in the incident that occurred on June 30, 2024. Her son is now facing trial for his alleged involvement. Prosecutors described how Heather Cummings held her mother’s wrists, allowing her 24-year-old son, Clifton Cummings, to allegedly strangle Loizides using a handbag strap.
Prosecutors said Heather Cummings told her mother during the fatal act, “This is for the best. You know what you did to my dad.”
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Documents sourced by the local CBS station WTKR reveal that Heather Cummings, who was residing in Indiana at the time, admitted shortly after her and her son’s arrest on July 9, 2024, to having a hand in her mother’s death. They faced charges of second-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder.
Loizides was discovered unresponsive in her accommodation at Commonwealth Senior Living on June 30, 2024, and was declared dead the next day. Autopsy findings led the medical examiner to conclude that her death was a homicide.
According to court documents, Clifton Cummings reportedly confessed to police that he was the one who strangled his grandmother to death with a handbag strap that was purchased at a Dollar Tree store in Virginia. Heather Cummings confessed to holding down her mother’s wrists during the alleged strangulation and saying to her mother, “Just let go, it’s for the best.”
Prosecutors said in court that Heather Cummings also told her, “You know what you did to my dad.” According to courtroom reporting by local ABC affiliate WAVY, Heather Cummings spoke to the court during her sentencing hearing and accused her late mother of being responsible for her father’s death. She also told the court that even though she suffered physical abuse at the hands of her mother, she still loved her and missed her.
According to prosecutors, Heather Cummings showed no remorse following her mother’s killing and discussed how she planned to live a peaceful life after the trial and make a book about her father’s photography.
Heather Cummings pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 40 years in prison. Clifton Cummings is scheduled for a bench trial on Aug. 4.
