Leila Fowler's Mom Says Not Finding Killer Makes Her Loss Worse
VALLEY SPRINGS (CBS13) — Leila Fowler's mother says she hasn't accepted that her daughter is gone, and the fact her killer hasn't been caught is only making it worse.
Eight-year-old Leila Fowler was stabbed to death by an intruder in her home on April 27. Services were held on Tuesday.
"No mother wants to bury her child," said Priscilla Rodriquez.
Priscilla is mother not only to Leila, but to her 12-year-old brother. He's the one who told investigators he saw a man running away the day of the killing, and then discovered Leila stabbed to death inside the home he shared with his sister and their father.
"I know my son has always been protective of his sister," Priscilla said. "He's having a really hard time, he's really struggling.
That boy, the only witness interviewed by detectives who so far haven't named a suspect. Now his mom says he's having a tough time with the gruesome images that market the beginning of life without his sister.
"I know he needs his mommy, just like I need him."
The hardest part is not knowing who took her daughter away and why.
"When I think of what she went through and what happened to her," she said before tearing up.
Priscilla says a bitter custody battle drove a wedge between her and the children's father. Now, she's a mother in mourning, yearning for closure.
She knows an arrest won't bring Leila back, but hopes the killer is locked up soon.
"I don't understand how anyone could hurt a child, a defenseless little girl, in her room."
