Skye Naggy (Westmoreland District Attorney’s Office).
A mother from Pennsylvania is on her way to prison for abducting her 6-year-old daughter and taking her to an isolated location where she administered opiates and fentanyl, believing a non-existent serial killer was pursuing them.
Skye Naggy, 32, received a sentence on Friday ranging from 10 to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty but mentally ill in January to charges of attempted homicide, aiding suicide, aggravated assault, kidnapping, interference with child custody, and endangering the welfare of a child, as announced by the Westmoreland County District Attorney’s Office in a press release.
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In November 2022, Naggy evaded the mental health treatment required for her and kidnapped her daughter. According to prosecutors, she left behind notes claiming she needed opioids for protection, as she had been warned by God about her imminent death.
Naggy took the child to a remote area on a trail near Loyalhanna Lake outside of Pittsburgh and made the girl ingest drugs. Police tracked Naggy’s phone and rescued the girl before she died. Officers found a Bible next to them. The girl tested positive for opiates and fentanyl.
Investigators determined Naggy was suffering from schizophrenia. The mother acknowledged her mental health troubles at her sentencing.
“My only goal was to save my daughter from a serial killer,” she said, according to a courtroom report from the Pittsburgh Tribune Review. “I did not realize I had schizophrenia until it was too late. If any unstoppable killer came after you, wouldn’t you make an escape plan? I promise I was just trying to save us.”
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Prosecutors said Naggy will continue to receive treatment while behind bars. The state argued at the sentencing hearing she would be a threat to herself or others should she be released at this time, per the Tribune Review.
Her defense attorneys asked for leniency.
“She has no criminal history and was not involved in the mental health system before this break,” her attorney Wayne McGrew reportedly said. “She should be in a treatment setting and that should be a hospital setting. It is a terrible thing that happened, but mental illness is also a terrible thing.”
McGrew asked for five years in prison while prosecutors requested 15 to 40 years.
In the end, the judge split the difference and gave Naggy between 10 and 20 years. She was given credit for the roughly 900 days already served.
The girl is currently in the custody of a relative.
