GALVESTON, Texas (AP) _ The wife of Royce Clyde Zeigler II never beat her 2-year-old daughter before marrying him, the child’s grandmother testified in the second day of the man’s capital murder trial.
Zeigler claimed in taped interviews with investigators that Riley Ann Sawyers was killed by Kimberly Dawn Trenor, the girl’s mother, during a disciplinary session while he was in another room.
But Sheryl Sawyers of Mentor, Ohio, testified Thursday that Trenor never used corporal punishment to discipline the girl. Riley and Trenor, 21, lived with her for the first two years of Riley’s life.
Zeigler, 26, is charged with capital murder in the death 2-year-old Riley, whose body was discovered in a plastic box on an island in the bay in 2007. Before her remains were identified,
Riley was called “Baby Grace.”