JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jacksonville Beach Police Department announced Friday night that a mother has been charged with the murder of her 3-year-old son.
Amy Oliver, 46, was arrested after her son was found unresponsive on the floor of a bedroom at a home on Republic Drive in Jacksonville Beach in October. The boy later died.
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Court records show the child was at the center of a custody dispute between his parents.
According to an arrest report, authorities were sent to the home after the child’s father called for help, saying the child wasn’t breathing. The boy was taken to a hospital, where he died, and police found Oliver had locked herself in a bathroom and refused to come out, the report said.
Oliver was taken to a hospital for treatment after paramedics tended to her self-inflicted wounds, the report said.
Police said they found a purse lying on the floor of a bathroom in the home and that a controlled substance was found inside the bag. The bond revocation motion said Oliver had used a razor to slash herself in the neck, wrists and upper thighs.
The motion also revealed that while police were trying to get Oliver out of the bathroom, a text message “strongly suggested that Defendant made a premeditated decision” to take the boy’s life and then her own, for the purpose of inflicting pain on the boy’s father and his family.
During an interview, Oliver said “the child didn’t suffer” and that she “did not want the child to go on living without her,” according to the Jacksonville Beach Police Department. The statements were made before she was told that her son had died, investigators said.
Oliver is held in the Duval County Jail on no bond. She’s charged with first-degree murder, aggravated child abuse and child neglect.