A Michigan woman has been sentenced to life in prison for the tragic death of a toddler she was babysitting. Kimora Launmei Hodges, 24, was found guilty of causing the fatal head injury to her friend’s 23-month-old son by violently throwing him against a wall.

Judge Diane M. Druzinski of the Macomb County Circuit Court handed down the life sentence without the possibility of parole to Hodges for the murder of young Kyrie Starks in 2022. The sentencing was announced on Tuesday.

The jury reached its verdict swiftly, taking only two hours in July to convict Hodges on charges of felony murder and first-degree child abuse. In addition to the life sentence for murder, Judge Druzinski imposed an extra 15 to 40 years for the child abuse conviction.

Hodges’s trial experienced delays as her defense team attempted to exclude certain statements she made to police, arguing that officers continued questioning her despite her request for legal counsel. An appellate court later decided that one of her statements could not be used in court.

According to previous reports by Law&Crime, the Roseville Police Department was alerted on June 22, 2022, after hospital staff reported a young boy had been admitted with severe head injuries about a week prior.

The child’s mother contacted authorities several days after retrieving him from Hodges’s residence on June 13, 2022. Hodges, who lived roughly 16 miles northeast of Detroit, had frequently babysat the child over the preceding months while his mother worked.

Hodges had reportedly contacted the mother that evening and said that the victim did not look normal. The mother then rushed to Hodges’ home, finding her son in dire straits.

“Once I made it there my baby was on the ground having seizure, after seizure, after seizure,” she previously told Detroit Fox affiliate WJBK.

Hodges initially blamed the boy’s condition on an “allergic reaction” to “eating soap,” the mother wrote on a GoFundMe page for her son. The boy’s mother said that she initially believed Hodges was telling the truth about her son having an allergic reaction until the medical staff at the hospital explained the full extent of the boy’s physical injuries.

“I believed her until the doctors told me otherwise because i trusted her i feel so betrayed cause i would’ve done anything for [Hodges] & her daughter,” she wrote, noting that Hodges’s child was the same age as her son.

“He had blunt force trauma to the head and he was bleeding out his ears and had to have immediate brain surgery,” the mother told WJBK. “All I know is she threw my son into the wall and shook him up pretty bad and they said that’s just a bit of what she did to him.”

Following her arrest, investigators said Hodges admitted to inflicting the fatal injuries on Kyrie.

“That’s not what was not supposed to happen,” she told detectives during the subsequent interview, per court documents. “You all just want me to blame. You all just want me to say I put my anger on [the victim]. That’s not what it is.”

Hodges went on to say, “Maybe I hit him too hard, but I didn’t take my anger out on him.”

The babysitter was initially only facing one count of first-degree child abuse, but after Kyrie died on June 15, 2022, prosecutors charged her with an additional count of felony murder.

“The sentence handed down today reflects the severity of the crime committed,” Macomb County Prosecutor Peter J. Lucido said in a statement. “The defendant’s actions resulted in the tragic death of an innocent child, and the court has imposed a life sentence without the possibility of parole to hold her fully accountable. Our thoughts remain with the victim’s family, whose lives have been forever changed by this senseless act. The justice system has a duty to protect the most vulnerable, and today’s sentence underscores that duty.”