Fort Wayne woman sentenced in 2021 child neglect death

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WPTA) - A Fort Wayne mother who pleaded guilty to several neglect charges resulting in her child’s death in 2021 has been sentenced.

In December of 2022, 38-year-old Emily Tudor pleaded guilty to one count of neglect of a dependent resulting in serious bodily injury and three counts of neglect of a dependent where the defendant endangers the dependent.

In court on Thursday, Tudor was sentenced to spend a total of nine years behind bars and three years on probation.

According to court documents, Tudor and her four children were staying at the Quality Inn on July 10, 2021. Around 2 a.m., a hotel employee found one of Tudor’s children running around the hotel knocking on doors without an adult. The employee told officers that when she went into the room to wake Tudor, she saw her lying in the bed with two other children. Documents say the employee said Tudor was partially laying on a third child that she didn’t see until Tudor rolled over.

Paramedics arrived and pronounced that third child dead at the scene.

A record of Tudor’s text messages showed instead of getting help for the child earlier, she texted with the father of the child, saying the girl was dead and that she had “a sh*t ton” of drugs in the room. He encouraged her to call 911 after he came to get all of the drugs and paraphernalia out of the hotel room. She later admitted to going on a “3-day binge” and a drug screen she took tested positive for meth, documents say.