Pepper Mogle saw her granddaughter, Missy, for the last time at the Leon County Courthouse, where the 5-year-old's allegedly abusive stepfather was on trial after his arrest in an undercover child sex sting.
Mogle’s daughter, Chloe Spencer, who is Missy’s mom, called April 15 to say the little girl was hungry. Mogle showed up with a Happy Meal from McDonald’s ‒ and a message of hope that she whispered into Missy’s ear.
“I told her that I loved her,” she said. “I kept giving her kisses and told her that I was trying everything I could to get her home.”
But Missy never made it back to her grandparents’ house in Wakulla County, where she was showered with love and attention for years before Chloe Spencer, 23, and her husband, 35-year-old Daniel Spencer, got custody of her.
Just weeks later, on May 19, after police said she suffered severe abuse at Daniel and Chloe Spencer’s home in an affluent Tallahassee neighborhood, Missy lost consciousness, was rushed to the hospital and died. Her mother and stepfather were arrested the same day and indicted on July 21 on first-degree murder charges. The pair could face the death penalty, prosecutors say.
