Honor Student Son Murders Mom

A gorgeous young mom, fast asleep, lying in bed right beside her newborn baby girl, is murdered. That's bad enough. The MO, the mode, the method of operation, the modus operandi itself, even more shocking. The young mom stabbed in the neck. That's not all. Now, behind bars, her 13-year-old son, honor student, described as meek and mild. A young mom dead in bed, asleep at the time, stabbed in the neck by her 13-year-old. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us here at Crime Stories and on Sirius XM 11.

Let's take a listen to the 911 call.

"You call her neck, okay? Where else did you stab her? All than that, cutting her neck. Where is your sister? She's in her crib sleeping. I cannot her. How old is your sister? She's only like a week old. Okay. And you did not touch her, correct? No, I did not touch her. I didn't want to touch my sister. I need to know if your mom is, is breathing. She's dead, man. I have the gun with me. I was going to shoot myself, but I didn't want to. I didn't want to. I pulled back the slide, but I did not. And more. I need to know. Do you think we can help your mom? She's dead. I have more family. Family members. They can take care of my sister. I took pictures and I told my friends about it. Was that bad? You told who about it? My friends. Your friends. Did you send pictures to your friends? So what you did? Yeah, I didn't delete the pictures off my phone, but I sent them to him and I told him I was sorry. And then I let goodbye. I'm okay. I'm, I'm really sorry."

Let me understand this. Uh, Caitlyn Becker is joining me, senior investigative reporter with dailymail.com. Caitlyn, wait. The 13-year-old honor student son kills mom, stabbing her multiple times in the neck, and then leaves his 14-day-old little sister alive. Takes pictures of his mom dead in the bed and sends them to a friend. What? Just start at the beginning, Caitlyn Becker.

Miss, this case is absolutely baffling. We have no idea what the motive is. This was about 11:30 at night. The son, as you said, 13 years old, is awake. Both the baby and mom are asleep. He goes into the bedroom, allegedly stabs mom to death. Like I said, leaves the baby untouched. And then he takes the picture, sends it to someone he barely even knows. I mean, he says the word "friend" in the 911 call. And when the dispatcher asks for a name, he says he doesn't know the friend's actual name. It's just someone that he plays games with online. So not even someone this child is close with. And then he calls 911 on himself. You could hear in the call that he's clearly distraught. And from everything we know about this kid, from friends and family, he's an honor student, well-mannered, well-behaved, quiet. This appeared to come out of absolutely nowhere. And his baby sister, who is 14 days old, is a half-sister. So his stepfather, who was a truck driver, was out of state working this night. So he wasn't there. And we know the gun that the child mentioned in that call belonged to the stepfather.

I want to hear that second sound again, Sydney, if you could play that one more time.

"I need to know. Do you think we can help your mom? She's dead. I have more family members. They can take care of my sister. I took pictures and I told my friends about it. Was that bad? You told who about it? My friends. Your friends. Did you send pictures to your friends? So what you did? Yeah, I didn't delete the pictures off my phone, but I sent them to him and I told him that I was sorry. And then I let goodbye. I'm okay. I'm sad. I'm really sad."

Joining me right now is high-profile lawyer Jason Oceans, New York, uh, based, but really practices all over, criminal and civil lawyer. Jason Oceans, have you ever had one piece of evidence, and you have like this 911 call, and you have to play it over and over because each line proves so much? Because you have this young perp who has just stabbed his mom in the neck. The little baby sister, just a few days old, lying there with her. And he says, not only that he did it, but he's speaking coherently. What can I learn from this 911 call, just the part that I've played so far?

He is coherent. He has taken pictures of his mother. This is his bio mom. He's taking pictures of her lying dead with her neck stabbed. And he has sent them to the friend. And he says this one thing, this is very important, it's critical. "Was that bad?" People only say "was that bad" when they know it's bad. "Was that wrong?" Yeah, it was wrong. He's barely, barely 13. Just, uh, just 12 a little bit ago. So he's not into his teens at all. No, you did not ask me that answer. You also called him a perp. He murdered his mother. Right. That's clearly, he murdered his mother. There's no... Would you disagree that he is not the perpetrator? No, he is the perpetrator. He is, in fact, the perp. Yeah. Yes. Okay. As we break it down, he is the perp. Okay. Back to the original question. In court, I would say something like, "As I looked at you glaringly, your honor, may I refresh the witness's recollection? May I redirect the witness?" As his answers are unresponsive. And I will ask you again, have you ever had a piece of evidence that the more you looked at it, the more you learned? Just one sentence, one piece of evidence. That clip from that 911 call, that one part of it.

Well, as, as a prosecutor, Nancy, you're looking that critically, and you see everything inside your case right there to prove it. I, I understand where you're coming from. I do not disagree with you. You're going to play that over and over, uh, in your head. You're going to play it over and over for the jury. You're going to play it over and over again. It's quite dispositive. There's not much to it. It's a slam dunk, uh, for me as an attorney. It goes beyond to mental health. You know, the comp... Is that wrong? That's not a perp. Is that wrong? That's a, that's a little boy. That's a troubled... Despite what the outside looked at, something, something snapped. Perhaps the birth of the new child, something happened, uh, that made him snap. That wasn't him. Uh, unless it's a legal defense. I mean, I see things in, uh, everything as, you know, Jason, we're longtime colleagues and friends. Everything to me now, once you go through law school and once you try cases for a living, you begin to see the world in a different way. Is it probative? Does it prove something? Is it admissible? If it's not admissible, I don't want to hear about it. I only want to know what I can put in front of a jury and what, how I can interpret that, and what is it true? Is it real? Did this happen? Do I have the right person? Why? I've got to leave that up to a shrink. Like a shrink, like Dr. James Garbarino, joining us, who specializes in what causes violence in children. Professor of Psychology, Emeritus, Cornell and Loyola University of Chicago. Wow. Author of "Listening to Killers: Lessons Learned from 20 Years as a Psychological Expert Witness in Murder Cases." Okay, I'm reading that Dr. James Garbarino. I'm not, I'm not saying that Jason Oceans is wrong. He's right. He's right. Does that mean that goes into my analysis of how I'm going to prove the case? I care about one thing: Am I getting a true verdict? Am I telling the jury the truth? Am I telling the jury the whole truth? And does what I give the jury advance the truth? So I don't care about who did this, where, when. Is it in my jurisdiction? And is there a legitimate defense, such as self-defense, insanity, accident? But Dr. James Garbarino, I want you to hear our cut three.

Our friends at crimeonline.com. Derek Rosa is not your typical 13-year-old boy. He's on the honor roll in eighth grade. Neighbors say he is exceedingly nice and friendly. He is the model son to his mother and respectful to his stepfather. He has been a big help to his 39-year-old mother, Irina Garcia. She just gave birth to a baby girl a couple of weeks ago. Derek Rosa is a good boy. He is a good boy. Dr. Garbarino, help me.

Well, you know, a lot of the, um, the focus of the criminal justice system is always, as you say, primarily, what did they do? Who did it? Um, you know, the kind of work that I've done for the last, uh, 30 years as a psychological expert witness really tries to get out who they are. I've worked on a number of kids who killed their parents over the years. You know, a lot of the kids who kill their parents, it's called reactive parricide. It's in response to abuse. But I have worked on cases like this that are mysterious at the outset because, you know, where does this come from? What does it mean? How do we make sense of it? Uh, you know, there are a number of possibilities. It's too early to know. Um, you know, there was a case in Oregon years ago where a boy killed his parents, and it turned out he was slipping into schizophrenia. He was hearing voices. And, you know, the, the thing about hearing voices in America, there's a fascinating study that finds that 70% of the voices that schizophrenics hear in America tell them to commit acts of violence against themselves or others. 70% in India, it's 20%. And in Africa, it's 10%. So, you know, we need to know what was his inner life like. That's certainly one possibility. I mean, there are other possibilities too that eventually may make sense of this. But it certainly doesn't sound like this is, you know, there's another case recently where a boy killed his mother because she wouldn't buy him some virtual reality headphones. Um, and he was only, you know, he was even younger than this, nine, I believe he was nine. You know, so we, we have to try to understand who this is. This doesn't sound like it's the culmination of an increasingly aggressive, antisocial, uh, kid who's entitled and maybe narcissistic, maybe even on the road to becoming a psychopath. It doesn't sound like that. It sounds like some very bizarre, uh, thing going on in his head, uh, that was kept, kept from the adults around him. You know, that boy in Oregon years ago, he told no one that he was hearing voices. I worked on another case of a 13-year-old, actually in Florida, who also killed his mother. No history of delinquency or antisocial behavior. But the more we got to know, the more we saw there was something going on in his head that again was telling him to do this in a way that, for a young kid, it can be very powerful. You know, the part of the brain that controls how intense kids feel things, how intense people feel things, the nucleus accumbens, it peaks at age 15, 14.5. So he's right in the period when everything feels more intense. You know, the role of this internet friend and connection, I mean, that's contaminating in another way. So we're just at the beginning of making sense of this, but I think eventually we will find a way to make sense of it.

I keep going over and over the evidence like I'm trying to solve a Rubik's Cube. Joining me, um, a longtime friend and colleague, Master Sergeant Ron Livingston with the Florida Highway Patrol, 30-plus years in law enforcement. Ron, I want you to take a listen to our cut 12, more of the 911 call. And the reason I keep playing that is because it's very hard for me to look at this kid, and he is a kid, as Jason Oceans accurately pointed out. And his whole past behavior is completely, completely opposite of that one act of murder. But listen to this 911 call.

"Ron Livingston, I need to know if your mom is, is breathing. She's dead. Blood all over the floor. Okay. Why did you kill your mom? I need to know. Do you think we can help your mom? She's dead. The police over here where I live. What is your address? Miss? Yes. I took pictures and I told my friends about it. Was that bad? You told who about it? My friends. Your friends. Did you send pictures to your friends? Of what you did? Yeah. Do not open until I tell you to open the door. And to make sure that you have nothing but your cell phone in your hands. Ma'am? Are they going to kill me? No, they're not going to kill you. We're here to help you. Okay? We're going to help your family. Okay? Okay."

Ron Livingston, Ron, if this were an adult, I would be arguing right now how clearly he knows exactly what's going on. He has not had a psychotic break. He is not insane. He knows cops are coming. And he says, "Are they going to kill me?" She says, "Do you have anything in your hands?" He goes, "I've got a cell phone." "Do you have anything else?" "No." "Are they going to kill me?" He knows exactly what's going to happen if cops come to the scene and he's got a gun in his hands, they're going to kill him. So there's no way he's going to be able to argue any kind of insanity.

Ron Livingston, have you ever seen anything like this or even closely akin to this?

You know, we, we see this over and over. And, you know, with, with social media, with, you know, with kids, they're so focused on, you know, social media. And, you know, they watch all the bad things that, that, that happen out here. And so, you know, the media has portrayed law enforcement, you know, to be bad, which, you know, we're not. We're there to help you. We're there to help everybody. And so I think that's been the biggest, you know, as far as the portrayal of media and stuff, as far as law enforcement. So I'm assuming that's where he's getting this, the law enforcement's going to kill me. And we're not. We're there to, we're there to help preserve the scene, to start the investigation. Obviously, we have to take, make sure the threat is under control. In law enforcement, there is no threat to law enforcement once they arrive.

To Dr. Tim Gallagher, joining me now, Medical Examiner of the State of Florida, lecturer, University of Florida Medical School, uh, in the Forensic Medicine Division, founder of the International Forensic Medicine, International Forensic Medicine Death Investigation Conference. Dr. Gallagher, this happened in your jurisdiction. This is in Hialeah. Could you explain to me, is there any way that this new mother, his mother, she's got a, a little baby girl, 14 days old, and she's sleeping in the room with the baby, is there any way that the mother didn't feel what happened to her? She was asleep when she was attacked.

I, I, I, I don't see a way. But is there a way? Uh, most likely not. You know, unless she was asleep under the influence of some substance. But, when people get stabbed, and they are, uh, sober, they feel every second of it. You know, you don't die from the stabbing. You actually die from bleeding to death. So that takes quite a while. And in that time, you were very, very aware of what's happening to you, the pain, your surroundings, who is doing it to you. And that can go on for several minutes before you finally exsanguinate or bleed to death. So, yes, uh, if she was not under the influence of anything that was putting her asleep, she felt every second of it, knew what was happening, and felt her life slipping away from her.

You know, that's not what I wanted you to say. Right? Is that, Caitlyn?

Yeah, I just wanted to jump in and elaborate a little. Please. In detail to that. That he, there were some local reports that, while we know that she was stabbed, the bed, her body was discovered on the floor. So I don't know if she had rolled off the bed or had tried to climb out of the bed, or if there were going to be defensive wounds. But the body was found on the floor. So that indicates to me that she moved in some way, shape, or form before ultimately exsanguinating. And that adds to what, that supports what you're saying, Dr. Tim Gallagher, that she knew very well what was happening, um, and was trying to either get away or protect her baby. I don't know what she was doing, but she did get out of bed.

What do you make of that, Dr. Gallagher?

Well, if you think about the emotional state that she was in, you know, she just had this baby. So she's in mother bear mode. You know, she really wants to protect the baby. Yet she's being attacked by her son, who she's also there to protect because he's really not of age to do that for himself. You know, so she was probably torn between, uh, those two circumstances in a, in a very unusual and very, uh, critical, uh, time of her life there. And just, um, I could see the confusion. I could see, you know, why she was thinking, why is this happening to me? You know, what is going on? And just a very, very confusing point. And I'd like to know if she did have any, uh, defensive wounds on her. Um, but, uh, just a crazy, crazy situation, just very, very unusual.

We know that she was lying on the floor next to the baby's crib. I wonder if she was trying to make her way to the baby to see.

I would hope so. Yeah. I would certainly.

Guys, we are talking about a 13-year-old boy, Derek Rosa, who is now charged with first-degree murder and the stabbing death of his own mother, lying right next to her, his 14-day-old little sister. Caitlyn Becker joining us, dailymail.com. Caitlyn, how many times was the mother stabbed?

I don't know the exact number, Nancy, but I do know that it was multiple times. It was a very bloody scene, and it was specifically in that sort of neck and upper region.

To Jason Oceans, joining us, high-profile lawyer out of New York and New Jersey. You know, he is going to be charged as an adult. There's really no choice. What do you make of it?

No, no disagreement, Nancy. I mean, uh, you know, when you have the direct evidence as you do as a prosecutor here, you're, uh, you're pretty limited, uh, in your defense. Uh, I think the approach, Nancy, is, is some sort of a plea, and hopefully you're getting him, you know, mental health assistance because, as, as the doctor was indicated, something snapped.

You do know, Jason Oceans, which we have discussed many, many times, snapped is not a defense. There's no such thing as "I snapped," or everybody in the county jail would say, "I snapped," and they'd all be walking out right now.

Yeah, they'd be snapping and saying it at the same time. No doubt. But for, for layman's terms, we understand what that is. A jury would understand that. Uh, it's not a defense. Uh, it's just, uh, discovering the underneath motive, which, uh, background doesn't, uh, consistent, doesn't in any way fit the violence of the act. It just doesn't, Nancy. You and I both know that. And so, in this case, as you're dealing with an almost a barely 13-year-old, just a couple of weeks ago was 12, you're, you're constrained in thinking that this young man should spend the rest of his life in prison. It's not death penalty eligible. Supreme Court has ruled that.

I'm not thinking anything right now because the duty of the prosecutor is to seek justice for the state. And the state represents the victim. The crime victim, the crime victim in this case is Irina Garcia, just 39 years old when she was brutally murdered, stabbed multiple times as she lay next to her 14-day-old baby girl. That's the interest that I have. I also care about what, if anything, went wrong with this young boy. He is going to be charged as an adult, as he should be. And yes, I have tried a 13-year-old for murder. In that case, the 13-year-old, 6'3" or 4", broke into a pawn shop, well, crashed into a pawn shop, murdered one, left another in a wheelchair, and a third shot, I believe, with a colostomy bag, over a handful of dope ropes, which is go thick gold chains. Uh, there you go.

Is this Dr. Garbarino? Please jump in. Dr. Garbarino, please. Thank you.

You know, I think, um, having worked on a number of these juvenile cases over the years, I mean, quite a number, I always think that we need to figure out which group they're in to start with. There is a group, even at 13, as you point out, who, who, who are so damaged that they, you know, it's going to take at least 20 years for them to recover. They need to get to age 25 when we can presume a mature brain, and then they need at least 10 years to use that mature brain to transform themselves and rehabilitate and educate and all the rest of that. And the evidence is actually pretty good that they, they can get better. Most of them do. That's really what's come out of the Miller versus Alabama, uh, decision about not sending juveniles to life without parole. That's one group.

Well, yeah, you can no longer send a juvenile to life without parole. Just like you cannot get, get a sentence of death penalty on a juvenile, right?

The second group are kids who have basically been intact in childhood, but they have a kind of adolescent crisis. It's often, uh, it's the onset of schizophrenia, it's a drug-related thing, it's, um, you know, influence of negative peers, a variety of things. The good news about them is most of them actually could be dealt with as a juvenile, setting aside the severity of the crime, which may preclude that for political and moral and legal issues. But they typically, you know, a guy once said to me in prison, "How can I get, how can I be rehabilitated if I was never habilitated in the first place?" And that's an important point. It sounds like this boy was habilitated. So this is a crisis that we need to understand what brought on the crisis, and he could be restored. There is a third group. It's a much smaller group who are, you know, as the Supreme Court said, irreparably corrupt. These are the kids who are simply on their way to becoming full-blown psychopaths. And, uh, you know, I've worked on those cases too, where it's not a matter of them getting better. It's not so much a matter of a crisis. It's a matter of something so profoundly wrong with them that it would take a miracle to transform that. So that's why I say we need to understand who this is. I understand as a prosecutor, and I sit across from a lot of prosecutors. You know, one, one prosecutor in Florida said to me, "I live with the stench of death." And I understand that mentality. But, you know, the interest of the state here should also be taking care of this boy, not just prosecuting.

Well, I've got a question for you, Dr. Garbarino. Could the birth of the little baby sister have been some sort of a triggering event for him?

Well, certainly could have been. You know, it had, it seems to have happened in such close time proximity. You know, as I understand it, he was the only child before. Who knows what this meant to him? You know, it's, it's the result of a stepfather impregnating his mother. Who knows what that meant to him? You know, because at a, from a child's point of view, regardless of how good the relationship is with the stepfather, he is an intruder in a sense. So, you know, we have to understand what this meant to him because, you know, there's, I think there's no such thing as a senseless act of violence. It always makes sense. You know, if we get inside the head of the perpetrator enough, it makes sense. We may not accept it, we may not appreciate it, but we have to get there. You know, I think we haven't talked about, you know, obviously a lot of things here. One being, you know, was committing this crime may have put him in what's called a dissociative state, that just disconnected. And that may be reflected in his call. But the other thing is, he talks about having a gun and not using it on himself, which suggests that he chose the knife over the gun because he had access to both. And that, I think, may end up being significant in understanding the crime. Because, as you well know, stabbing is a very different, uh, internal process often than shooting. And it really, again, suggests to me that there's something we don't know yet that's really deep and big and dark inside him that that led to this particular form of attack. And again, I, I think we just got to understand this, um, because it's not like a, it's not like a lot of other murders that juveniles committed. Uh, and, um, I just hope the system will be able to find a way to to understand that, make sense of it.

Well, I want you to hear something else, Dr. Garbarino, and everyone on the panel. Listen to the boy's behavior afterwards. Take a listen.

Our cut 7 from our friends at crimeonline.com. Neighbors in Hialeah, Florida, shot footage as police showed up to arrest a killer. The scene filmed by a neighbor and posted online is not a crazy maniac. This murderer is a 13-year-old honor student. The boy is standing timidly on the balcony of his apartment as he is on the phone with 911. The boy called to confess. And now the 911 operator is giving him instructions. The boy follows the instructions, putting his hands up in the air and obeying the police directly in front of him. When the police finally get close enough, they take Derek Rosa to the ground hard. He's put in handcuffs and taken away.

To Caitlyn Becker joining us, senior investigative reporter, dailymail.com. He clearly is following instructions. He understands what's happening. He is not out of his mind. He's not having a psychotic break. All that is actually going to work against him at trial because he clearly knows what's going on and he knows what he did was wrong.

Caitlyn, you hear that sadness and that remorse in the call? You can hear him getting choked up and being overwhelmed by his alleged actions. I do think that will work against him at trial. But Nancy, on the flip side, at one point, the dispatcher asks him his address. He doesn't know his address. I feel like a defense attorney is going to say, this 13-year-old boy, who is barely even 13, who didn't even know where he lived, didn't understand the magnitude of his actions, maybe until after it was, it was done. Um, I don't know. I think that a jury might look at the 911 call and hear this broken little boy calling and, you know, talking to the dispatcher and responding to her, "No, ma'am," "Yes, ma'am," and being polite and sort of trying to rectify that version of the child who's on the phone with the brutality of the murder. I think it's going to be tough.

To Jason Oceans, a veteran trial lawyer. And I'm going to quote verbatim the law. Uh, "One may immediately regret the deed, but that regret does not negate intent at the time of the act." There's premeditation here. He has to creep into the mother's room while she lays sleeping. He waits until the moment she is asleep in the dark of the night. He goes in with a knife. He goes into the mother's bedroom with a knife. There are multiple stabs. Premeditation can be formed in the twinkling of a moment. So between each stab is another period in which premeditation can be formed. That's what premeditation means. Now, it may not mean that to a layperson on the street, but the jury, if there is one, will be instructed that that is what premeditation means. It's not a long, drawn-out scheme, such as someone poisoning the victim over a period of months or even years. It can be formed in an instant. So he has premeditation. He knows what he is doing is wrong.

What about that, Nancy?

I, I'm not going to disagree with you in any of your approach and your prosecutorial position. You've explained it well, you've articulated it, you're going to go ahead. The only thing I would say relative to being counsel, uh, for the defense, is don't over-prosecute because he's not, notwithstanding all of your case, he's still sympathetic at barely 13. He is, he is, he is.

Master Sergeant Ron Livingston joining us out of this jurisdiction in Florida. Are juveniles this age housed in an adult jail facility?

No, ma'am. They, uh, they will be housed in a Juvenile Detention Facility, um, in the State of Florida. We're not allowed. Juveniles are not allowed to be in a jail with adults longer than six hours. So process, once they're processed, they're taken out and turned over to Department of Juvenile Justice.

In the last hours, this young man, 13-year-old Derek Rosa, has pled not guilty in a court of law. And you may be very surprised at what happens in court. Take a listen.

Our cut A. It's very unfortunate that this tragedy occurred, but this child is very humble, very peaceful. Now, you are hearing his father, his biological father, Mr. Rosa, in court. He describes his son as humble and peaceful. And more. Take a listen.

Our cut B. And brother, it's hard for us to explain how this occurred. Um, you know, it's, it's difficult. But I guess what we're asking for is another opportunity, a second chance to help him grow and become mature as a grown man, to, to put this behind him and say, "We have your back. We're here to support you."

Caitlyn Becker joining us from dailymail.com. What happened in court?

Court was really emotional. Not only was it the young boy's father, it was also his grandmother. They sent some 20 letters of support trying to get him a little bit of leniency. And in court, he was, when the charges were upgraded to first-degree murder and he was charged as an adult, he was taken out of the juvenile facility and remanded into an adult facility. I don't know how long he stayed there or if he's still there. But his attorney in court, his attorney, Kristen Roso, um, had plans to request what's called an Arthur hearing to try to secure him bond, even though it's not a bondable offense. And she also requested in court that her client be returned to juvenile custody. But that is something the judge said that they would have to determine at a, at a later date, and they were going to review all of that. So I do know he was taken into an adult facility. I don't know how long he he would have remained, but he's going to stay in custody until his next hearing, which at this point isn't until February.

Back to Master Sergeant Ron Livingston. It's confusing when you hear the verbiage that we just heard from Caitlyn Becker, and everything she said is correct. The judge has to determine the exact age of the defendant, and that has to be weighed against the charges. But this juvenile will be housed separately from adults. He will not be in general population. He will not have an adult roommate. None of that's happening. He is being taken to an adult facility until it's sorted out where he should be because he's charged with murder one. But in the State of Florida, and across the country, juveniles are not put in cells or amongst grown men. That is not happening. Please confirm that.

Yes, ma'am. They, they cannot be in sight, nor can they speak or talk to any, any adults. Um, you know, typically, and in this case, might be a little different. I mean, the judge could actually overrule it. But typically, the law in Florida is, is a juvenile does not stay in the, in, in an adult jail for longer than a process, and then they're removed. Now, Miami-Dade, they might have a, you know, a section that's completely segregated from the adults, to where they put him and house him to where he is not in view, contact, can't speak to any adults. That's, that's very strictly prohibited. Yes. Yes.

Guys, I want you to also hear more of this young man's father, Mr. Rosa, in court. Listen.

"Derek's mother recently had a child, and she was overwhelmed with a lot of the work. It's not taking away anything from what occurred, um, and I wish if we could bring, you know, the went back to yesterday or the day before that occurred."

To Dr. Tim Gallagher, Medical Examiner for the State of Florida and the founder of the International Forensic Medicine Death Investigation Conference. Dr. Gallagher, I want to go through. We keep talking about the boy. What happened to the boy? The boy is an honor student. He had always been timid. He was a great son, very respectful, on and on and on. I want to talk about the mother, the new mother. Tell me what she went through as her life ebbed away from her, and she tried valiantly to get over to the crib where her 14-day-old daughter was sleeping.

Well, um, Nancy, I mean, she's in a very, very difficult position, as we discussed before. Um, she is in fight or flight mode. Now, she doesn't know whether to run and save her life or to run back to her crib and protect her newborn baby. So she is going to be in the presence of the son with the knife, you know, for as long as it takes. Uh, she's probably already received a fatal wound. She is bleeding. She's actively bleeding to death at this point. And she has a decision to make. You know, do I sacrifice my life for the safety of my newborn? Do I run and try to save myself, you know, by going out the door and exiting the situation? Uh, all this time, uh, she is getting weaker, she is getting weaker, and the, uh, ability for her to reason is becoming less, as the, less amount of blood can reach her brain and affect her reasoning center. Uh, so she is in a very difficult position. And it, and it looked like ultimately she chose, uh, to protect her baby because that's approximately where she was found, uh, when she was deceased.

You know, Dr. Gallagher, M. Dr. Gallagher, uh, and I've done this myself in the case of my fiance being murdered. I like to tell myself, well, he didn't feel it, he didn't suffer because he was shot so many times in the face and the neck and the head. But, you know what, Dr. Gallagher? That's probably not true. Because people that have survived gunshot wounds, some of them have said, "I didn't even realize I was hit." Others say, "How much it hurt." And I, mhm. Stab wounds have got to be just incredibly painful. I, I think she, she really suffered. And she got out of the bed and tried to get to the baby's crib. She knew she was bleeding. She knew she had been stabbed. She probably knew who had stabbed her as she was dying. I, I, I have no doubt in my mind she suffered.

Oh, absolutely, absolutely. You know, people who get shot in the bed don't even wake up. You know, they, they are found exactly where they were sleeping. But people who get stabbed wake up. They feel the pain, and they wake up, and they try to defend themselves. And this, this apparently is the case here. And that, that's the result of knowing what's going on, of feeling the pain. Yes, they were suffering.

We wait as justice unfolds. Goodbye, friend. Guys, thank you for watching Crime Online with Nancy Grace here on YouTube. To get the very latest, subscribe to Crime Online here.