Mother Charged with 11-Month-Old’s Death Accepts Plea Deal

By Bersabel Ephrem [former] - January 26, 2022
Court | Daily Stories | Homicides | Juveniles | Suspects | Victims |

A mother accepted a plea deal more than a year after she was arrested for the death of her infant child.

Makenzie Anderson was approximately two weeks shy of her first birthday when she died. At the time, her mother, Tyra Anderson, was staying with Makenzie and her three other children in a hotel on the 1600 block of New York Avenue, NE. Makenzie was last seen in surveillance footage on Feb. 1, 2020.

The prosecutor said that on the afternoon of Feb. 6, 2020, Metropolitan Police Department officers were dispatched to the Children’s National Medical Center because the infant was displaying signs of physical abuse.

Anderson, 28, told medical personnel as well as the officers on the scene that the victim fell off of the bed and began having shaking episodes, during which Anderson proceeded to pick her up and shake her. Anderson claimed that she found the infant cold to the touch the following morning, Feb. 6, which is when she took her to the hospital.

The following December, Anderson was arrested and charged with first-degree cruelty to children and felony murder. On Jan. 26, she pleaded down to voluntary manslaughter as part of an agreement with the prosecution.   

DC Superior Court Judge Rainey Brandt accepted the plea and scheduled Anderson to be sentenced on March 31.