Woman sentenced to death for murder of stepdaughter

Tiffany Moss, 36, showed no emotion as the Gwinnett County jury delivered the death sentence Tuesday morning, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

On Monday, Moss was found guilty of all counts, including murder, cruelty to children and trying to conceal the death of 10-year-old Emani Moss by burning her body in a trash can.

Moss represented herself at trial and mounted no defense. She made no opening statement or closing argument and called no witnesses.

Her death sentence was the first handed down in Georgia in more than five years.

At trial, prosecutors painted a damning picture of Moss, who they said kept her young stepdaughter confined to a bedroom in their Lawrenceville-area apartment, slowly starving her to death.

A medical examiner described how Emani wasted away without food or water and lived in waste in her own bed because she’d become too weak to move. Authorities say she weighed just 32 pounds (14 kilograms) when she died.

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Prosecutors highlighted text messages sent by Tiffany Moss to her husband, Eman Moss, during the time when Emani was being starved. At least twice, Moss sent her husband pictures of meals she had prepared for him and her own two children the couple shared.

Prosecutors said it likely took weeks for Emani to die of starvation.

After the girl’s death, Tiffany and Eman Moss stuffed her emaciated body in a trash can and set it on fire.

Eman Moss is serving life in prison without parole for his role in the crime, after pleading guilty to felony murder in 2015 in exchange for testifying against his wife.

Late Monday, jurors asked Gwinnett Superior Court Judge George Hutchinson if they could go home to “sleep on” the sentencing decision after reaching an impasse. The jury of six men and six women agreed to the death sentence after resuming deliberations 9 a.m. Tuesday.