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CLARKSDALE, Miss. (WREG) — Loved ones came together Saturday to honor the short life of a baby who died after being stabbed and put in a hot oven alive.
Investigators say Carolyn Jones, 48, stabbed her 20-month-old granddaughter, Royalty Floyd, last month, then put her in a hot oven to die.
Family called Royalty ‘Big Girl.’
“She was ‘Big Girl.’ But from the day she was born, she was granddaddy’s baby girl. And she knew it,” her grandfather, James Harris, said in an emotional speech at Saturday’s funeral.
An autopsy shows Royalty died from sharp force trauma and thermal injuries.
Another relative made the gruesome discovery Oct. 15 and called police.
Family tells WREG the baby lived with her grandmother in a home in Shaw, Mississippi.
“I miss her,” Harris said. “But she’ll always be with me. Always.”
The baby’s father, John Floyd, opened up about his daughter’s death for the first time at her funeral.
“I still find it unbelievable to tell you the truth,” he said. “And to try and make heads or tails of what happened, it’s still something I can’t comprehend right now. It ain’t soaking in for some reason. I’m thinking one day this is all something that isn’t real.”
It’s unclear why Royalty lived with her grandmother, but the baby’s mom, Veronica Jones, defended her mother in a Facebook post the morning after the murder, saying: “I’m being told that my mother stabbed my daughter and baked her in the oven but my mother loved my daughter. She always treated Royalty like Royalty and everybody that knows us knows that.”
That same day, the baby’s toys were spotted in a garbage can in front of the home. But neighbors say the toys had been there for a week before she was killed.
“I’ll never forget her,” Harris said. “I don’t want anybody else to forget her. She’ll always forever live in our hearts and everything we do.”
Investigators still don’t know why Jones might have killed her granddaughter and haven’t said if she was struggling with a mental disorder.
She’s charged with first-degree murder.
Police say they had never responded to the home in the past for any kind of crime.
Jones is being held on a $500,000 bond.
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