A local woman has been indicted on a charge of first-degree murder in the death of her five-year-old daughter in 2022.
Rachel Leonard, 38, was arrested on Sept. 9 and was being held in the Montezuma County Detention Center on a $2 million bond as of Friday.
According to the indictment, which was recently unsealed, a sheriff’s deputy responded to Leonard’s Montezuma County home in the middle of the morning on March 29, 2022, after a 911 call from another resident of the house. The deputy reportedly found the child dead on the floor of Leonard's bedroom and Leonard hysterical.
Members of the Lewis-Arriola Fire Department, as well as paramedics and EMTs, also responded to the scene, the indictment says. They reportedly found vomit on the bed and Leonard screaming frantically. She was taken by ambulance to the hospital and was later airlifted to St. Mary’s Hospital in Grand Junction. According to the indictment, one paramedic said she did not answer questions at the house or during the ambulance ride.
Leonard reportedly had insomnia and there were sleep gummies and melatonin in the room.
The indictment says Dr. Michael Arnall, a pathologist who performed the autopsy on the girl’s body with assistance from Montezuma County Coroner George Deavers, could not find a cause of death. No abnormalities were found, the document states, other than “mild cerebral edema.”
The cause of death was listed as undetermined.
Per standard procedure, the unexplained death was investigated as a homicide.
Investigators with the Montezuma County Sheriff’s Office and Colorado Bureau of Investigation learned that Leonard was very upset the night before the child’s death because when she took her to Telluride on March 26 to meet up with the girl’s father, Brian Sandoval of Montrose, for a visit, he brought his new girlfriend along
Leonard and Sandoval had broken up after a brief relationship and had an informal arrangement where they would meet in Telluride for custody exchanges, the indictment says, and they had agreed not to bring “other people.”
However, according to the indictment, when Leonard picked the girl back up on March 28 after that visit, the 5-year-old said she wanted to stay with her “new family.”
In January 2023, investigators obtained a search warrant for Leonard’s iPhone and found that the phone’s user had done a Google search on March 27, 2022, on “how long does it takes to suffocate.” The user then went to a website that had a forum discussion about suffocating someone with a pillow, the indictment states.
According to the indictment, the phone’s user had also searched on March 23 on the question “will 150 500 mg of Tylenol pm overdose?”
Coroner Deavers reportedly testified before the grand jury that issued the indictment and said that suffocation may leave no signs on the victim that could be found in an autopsy. He said someone could put a pillow over a victim’s face and there would be no signs except some cerebral edema.
The attorneys representing Leonard have questioned the strength of the indictment, filing three motions on Sept. 10 of this year, including one to review probable cause and to quash the indictment, one seeking discovery of the grand jury proceedings, and one concerning speaking with law enforcement.
The prosecution responded on Sept. 12 that they would provide the court with the necessary materials to conduct a probable cause review but that they asked the court to deny the motion for discovery of grand jury proceedings. The prosecution said it is complying with all the defendant’s wishes regarding speaking with law enforcement so the third motion is moot.
Leonard is set for a plea hearing in District Court in Cortez on Oct. 10.
