Woman lived in Texas home for 3 years with mom's decomposing body, police say

Police in Texas arrested a woman Wednesday they said lived in a home with her child, who was under 15, for three years while her mother's body was decomposing in a bedroom, KSAT reported.

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Delissa Navonne Crayton, 47, of Seguin, was booked into the Guadalupe County Jail on Sunday night and charged with injury to a child under the age of 15 causing serious mental deficiency and injury, the television station reported. She is being held in lieu of a $200,000 bond.

The skeletal remains of Jacqueline Louise Crayton, who was 71 when she died in 2016, were found in the bedroom of the home, Seguin police Chief Terry Nicholls told The Seguin Gazette.

“Investigators believe that during 2016, Jacqueline Louise Crayton suffered a non-life-threatening fall in the bedroom at the residence she shared with her daughter and granddaughter,” Nicholls told the newspaper. “At the time of the fall, Delissa Crayton failed to provide adequate assistance and we investigators believe Jacqueline died within a few days while lying on the floor.”

Nicholls said when police went to the home to do a welfare check on Delissa Crayton's daughter, they found the skeletal remains on the floor behind a door, which was unlocked, the Gazette reported.

“The door was simply shut,” Nichols told the newspaper reported. “Our first officer who was on the scene went in to do a welfare check and opened the door and found the skeletal remains. They were in a bedroom on the floor in plain view.”

Jacqueline Crayton had worked for the Seguin Independent School District from 1965 until her retirement in 2000, KSAT reported. She was a teacher's aide and secretary and also spent many years working in the special education department, the television station reported.

Delissa Crayton formerly worked for the Seguin Police Department as a dispatcher, the Gazette reported.

The teen has been placed in the care of family members, Nicholls said.

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