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Tenia Campbell (left) holds her head in her hands after her arrest in June 2019 (CBS New York/YouTube screengrab), (right inset) Jasmine and Jaida Campbell (Tenia Campbell/Facebook)
A 28-year-old Long Island woman arrested four years ago after driving around in a family van with her “executed” twin daughters in their car seats has pleaded guilty to murder, prosecutors announced Wednesday.
In late June 2019, Tenia Campbell held her head in her handcuffed hands and hid her face from the public as police officers hauled her into court, where she faced charges for the manual asphyxiation murders of her 2-year-old daughters Jaida and Jasmine.
Campbell, from Medford and also the mother to a young son, on the afternoon of June 27, 2019, was found outside of her family van near Montauk Point, approximately an hour and half drive away from where she lived, after her mother called 911 around 2:37 p.m. to report her threats to kill her twins. Campbell had said on the phone that she “was sorry but didn’t want to live anymore” and that she planned to “kill herself and her babies,” CBS News reported.
Prosecutors said that by 4 p.m. on that fateful day, the victims were found dead in their car seats inside of the van Campbell was driving.
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According to the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office, Tenia Campbell “later admitted” that she smothered the twin girls to death.
CBS reported, citing Campbell’s mother, that the defendant said “I killed them with my bare hands” and that she was driving to Montauk Point so she could “find the ocean and walk into it so she could be with her babies in heaven.”
The suspect, described as having a “very long history” of mental illness, had been acting “very irrational and angry” prior to the slayings, the victims’ grandmother reportedly said.
Tenia Campbell mug shot (Suffolk County DA)
On Wednesday, DA Raymond Tierney announced Campbell formally admitted to two counts of first-degree murder, meaning she will face 20 years to life in prison when she’s sentenced on Jan. 25 of the new year. The DA said that the defendant “executed” Jaida and Jasmine.
“This is such a sad and tragic case. Those two little girls looked to this defendant, their mother, for protection and love. Instead, she executed them,” Tierney said. “The defendant has one thing those twin girls will never have again: life. But now, this defendant will get to live out the majority of her life behind bars.”
