Editor’s Note: This story contains mention of child abuse and mental health issues and could be upsetting to some readers.
A Superior Court judge has ordered a status hearing to discuss a psychiatric update filed under seal in the case of Anyah Smith, the mother accused of drowning her daughter in St. Thomas Harbor in March 2024.
Judge Sigrid M. Tejo has set the hearing for 9 a.m. Feb. 24 in Courtroom 3 on St. Thomas and directed that a copy of her order be sent to Bureau of Corrections Director Wynnie Testamark, Health Commissioner Justa Encarnacion, and Christina James Todman of the Health Department’s Division of Behavioral Health.
It’s the first hearing in the case since Jan. 14, 2025, the results of which are not publicly available on the court docket. A hearing held one week earlier, on Jan. 7, 2025, noted that the court was still awaiting a report from psychiatrist Dr. Evadne Sang regarding Smith’s stability, as well as the status of her placement at a behavioral health facility on the mainland. At the time, Smith was being held at the John A. Bell Adult Correctional Facility on St. Croix and appeared via Zoom at her court proceedings.
On Jan. 29, 2025, the court ordered that it be notified when Smith was transferred to Larkin Community Hospital, Behavioral Health Services in Hollywood, Florida, but there have been no docket entries since to indicate whether that took place.
The territory does not currently have a mental health facility and according to a report last week by the Virgin Islands Daily News, the Health Department has abandoned plans to construct one because it is “cost-prohibitive,” with an architectural and engineering firm estimating it would total about $242 million.
Smith, who was 32 at the time of her arrest, is charged with first-degree murder, second-degree murder, reckless endangerment, assault, domestic violence, aggravated child abuse and child neglect. She has pleaded not guilty.
At her advice of rights hearing on March 19, 2024, Smith was ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation to determine her competency to stand trial, her sanity at the time of the incident, and whether she was a danger to herself or the community before she could be released on $750,000 bail, secured in cash or property.
According to police and court records, Smith’s mother called police just after 2 a.m. on March 16, 2024, to ask for a wellness check of her daughter whom she feared was having a psychotic breakdown.
Smith’s daughter, Ja’Qeada Isaac, 9, had sent a text to a relative saying that her mother had destroyed all the devices in the home and was in the process of destroying the cellphone. Police arrived at the family’s Agnes Fancy home to find articles strewn on the ground but could not find Smith or her daughter. Meanwhile, friends and family were searching for the pair as well.
A surveillance recording taken along Veterans Drive near the Finance Department in downtown Charlotte Amalie showed the mother and child sitting on the bulkhead facing the harbor and then entering the water a short while later. Two witnesses and police later found the mother with the child on her back close to two miles away near Vitraco Mall.
It was then, court records said, that Smith told one witness that the child was dead. Police on the scene removed the girl from the mother’s grasp while friends and family tried to revive her. “While rendering CPR to the victim, water came out of the victim’s mouth,” investigators said.
Ja’Qeada was pronounced dead by emergency medical technicians who arrived on the scene around 5:30 that morning. Smith was taken to the Richard Callwood Police Command and later to the Roy L. Schneider Hospital to treat a cut on her foot and for psychiatric observation.
At the police station, Smith was described as barefoot and wearing wet clothes. When she was asked about her footwear, investigators recounted her saying she left them on the waterfront.
When police visited the scene, they found the footwear near the Emil E. White Memorial plaque. A dive team also found the daughter’s public school identification card from the Jane E. Tuitt Elementary School.
They also found a cinder block with an electrical cord attached and a noose on the other end.
“It is believed that the defendant tied one end of the white electric cord to the concrete block and looped the other end around the victim, and the defendant and the victim went into the water,” court documents said.
