While they were in the care of their grandmother, a 7-month-old infant died in a hot environment months after her older brother drowned in a pool.
Following the terrible passing of her grandchildren, 65-year-old grandma Tracey Nix has been charged with aggravated manslaughter.
On November 22, in Florida, Uriel Schock passed away in the back seat of an SUV that his grandmother Tracey Nix allegedly left unattended.
According to the Hardee County Sheriff’s Office complaint document, the grandmother, a former school principal, claimed she “simply forgot” about the baby after driving home after lunch and going to practice piano, leaving Uriel alone all afternoon in 32C heat with the windows up.
The horrible incident occurred just three months after Ezra, Uriel’s brother, drowned in a pond at Nix’s house while he was 16 months old and left unsupervised.
On that particular Tuesday, when her daughter Kaila Nix was getting her hair done, Tracey Nix was taking care of her granddaughter.
Following Ezra’s passing, Kaila and her partner Drew Schock “didn’t trust [Tracey] at all” and would never permit their firstborn child, Tracey, then four, to remain with her mother.
“We were anxious, but I loved my mother and I am a daughter that wanted her mom in her life in some capacity, and in that moment, I thought that I could believe in second chances,” Kaila said.
She said the “very minor amount of time” that Nix saw Uriel was “almost always supervised.”
But Uriel was left unattended on 22 November, 2022, until one of Tracey’s grandsons arrived and “all of a sudden” she realized she had left the infant in the car all day.
Her husband, Nun Ney Nix, performed CPR on the child unsuccessfully.
Nix attended a pretrial hearing on March 28, 2023.
Speaking to WFTS-Tampa, Kaila said: “If I’m objective, she needs to go to prison. As her daughter it kills me to say it. As their mother I demand it.”
They said they would want Ezra and Uriel to know “that we love them and that we are sorry”.
Ezra Nix drowned in a pond near Tracey’s home while unattended just days before Christmas 2021.
A Hardee County police report said that Tracey was at home with Ezra when he died.
She had fallen asleep on the couch in the living room while her partner was running errands. When she woke up and could not find the child, she called her husband.
Tracey then found young Ezra lying face down about knee-deep in the large pond within feet of their home.
She did not call 911 and started CPR, as reportedly learned during her time as an educator.
Tracey’s husband then called Drew, who told the child’s mother “something happened to Ezra.”
Kaila, who was then six-months pregnant, sped to her mother’s house, hitting 85mph on country roads and was involved in a head-on collision with another car.
Seeing the helicopter land overhead, she said she got out and ran without shoes to her mother’s house in “desperation to get my son”.
Tracey was not charged for the “one-time lapse of judgement”.
On Facebook, distraught mother Kaila told of her heartbreak as her son was taken off life support and died in her arms on 23 December 2021.
Uriel was born three months later in March 2022.
She said two hours after leaving her mother with Uriel to attend an appointment, Hardee County Sheriff’s Office told her that her mother had left her daughter “to die alone in her car”.
She wrote in November last year: “Completely broken. Traumatized. Enraged. Devastated. Overwhelmed.”
She now seeks justice for Uriel and Ezra.
A police report from May noted that the Tracey “did commit the offence of child neglect”, falling asleep while watching Ezra and citing redacted medications as possible causes.
Her husband told police they had issues with Ezra opening doors.
Nun had pulled the door to the garage shut and placed a metal door stop behind the door, he said.
Tracey said that the doorstop was not in use.
Then in November 2022, local police arrived again to tell the mother her baby had died.
“And I said, ‘I’m sorry, what? I know Ezra’s dead. Why are you here, like what – what is this?’” Kaila recalled.
And she was told, “No Kaila, your baby is dead.”
Kaila’s partner, Drew, said: “You couldn’t fathom it happening twice. Somebody has to answer for that.”
Tracey’s attorney told the i-Team at ABC Action News that Nix would not be making public statements.
He said Tracey was “totally devastated” by the deaths.
