Posts Tagged With 'Cummings'

Crystal Sheffield-the Biological Mother Haleigh Cummings

Mar 25, 2009  1 Comment »  Read More 

Crystal Sheffield, the biological mother of missing Haleigh Cummings has hired an attorney.

She was interviewed on Nancy grace’s show recently. Heres the transcript.

Nancy Grace: Ms. Picazio, everyone, Kim Picazio is joining us today for her first TV interview. She’s joining us out of Plantation, Florida and she has been hired by Haleigh’s biological mother, Crystal Sheffield. Now Ms. Picazio, how long has your client not had physical custody of little Haleigh?

Crystal Sheffield, the biological mother of missing Haleigh Cummings

Crystal Sheffield, the biological mother of missing Haleigh Cummings


Kim Picazio: It’s been for several years and it was — actually we just found out today that the modification proceeding I don’t believe was ever filed. I need to speak with that attorney that was retained by Ms. Sheffield to file that proceeding and I have to defer to the court documents on that which I am in the process of obtaining. Again, there are grave concerns with regard to Junior and with regard to the household that Haleigh would be potentially returned to. There have of course been allegations but again, if you can imagine…

Nancy Grace: Allegations of what?

Kim Picazio: Allegations with regard to what was actually going on in that home prior to Haleigh disappearing and on that night. I mean we’ve got a situation where we have a four-year-old child in the home with a home that’s actually, the seven-year-old, I’m sorry; the five-year-old child had disappeared right under the nose of the baby sitter. But then we learn is a teenage baby sitter who is also living with the father in a romantic relationship. This is not the first time that he has chosen a teenager to fall in love with and to live with.

Nancy Grace: Are you suggesting abuse on little Haleigh?

Kim Picazio: I’m not suggesting that as of yet and we have not…

Nancy Grace: I’m glad to hear it.

Kim Picazio: We have not uncovered anything as of yet and I’d like to do my own investigation. Authorities are looking into every single avenue. But I have grave concerns again about the ability and the fitness of the parent who is going to consistently choose teenagers to watch their children.

Nancy Grace: Well, a couple of points Ms. Picazio and believe me, I know you are a well-respected member of the bar. But I find it ironic that now is the time when the bio mom arranges all of her media requests that she suddenly decides that Haleigh had been in a bad environment. She’s certainly known all along whom the father is dating and according to the judge in your client’s custody case, the mother, your client, did not have a job. The father did. Haleigh missed a total that we know of, 12 doctor’s appointments while living with the mother. Now maybe there’s an explanation for that, but I know the child has Turner’s syndrome and the mother not only didn’t have a job, but didn’t take the child to the doctor. It’s not like she was working all day and couldn’t make time to take the child to the doctor. I don’t understand that.

Kim Picazio: Well, there’s also, we have to look into the father’s history of taking the child to the doctor. Haleigh was never a child who was well. She had chronic pneumonia and bronchial problems and the father would often leave the children to a teenager who he was living with to drive this child to the doctor on a regular basis.

Nancy Grace: Why do you speak of Haleigh in the past tense? I notice that you said she always was a child with a lot of physical problems.

Kim Picazio: Because she doesn’t have those physical problems anymore.

Nancy Grace: OK, with me everyone, Kim Picazio, attorney newly hired, attorney newly retained for Haleigh’s biological mother.

  • Chrystal Sheffield Gets Custody
  • Ronald, Misty and Haleigh family Photo’s

    Nancy Grace airs on HLN nightly at 7:00 pm and 9:00 pm Central Time.

  • Haliegh Cummings is Missing

    Mar 13, 2009  10 Comments »  Read More 

    Another child, Haliegh Cummings is Missing from her Florida home.

    Haleigh is 3 feet tall with blond hair and brown eyes. She was last seen wearing a pink shirt and underwear.

    Haleigh Cummings missing from Florida home

    Haleigh Cummings missing from Florida home


    Misty Croslin, now the wife off Ronald Cummings, the father of the missing Florida girl has taken a lie detector test, a local sheriff said. He wouldn’t reveal the results of the test, but the father and his wife said Thursday night during an interview with FOX News’ Greta Van Susteren that they both submitted to polygraphs and both “passed.”

    Croslin reported that 5-year-old Haleigh Ann-Marie Cummings had vanished from her bed before dawn on Tuesday, February 10, 2009.

    Several people have been interviewed by police and the FBI, and all have been offered the chance to take a lie detector test, Putnam County Sheriff’s spokesman Gary Bowling said. Detectives believe Haleigh was abducted — and they aren’t overlooking anyone, including family members, as suspects.

    Ground searches continued for a third day on Thursday. Bloodhounds have been used, but haven’t turned up any clear evidence.

    “We have nothing definitive to say where the child is based on the bloodhounds,” Hardy told reporters at a Thursday news conference. Evidence has been collected from the mobile home where Haleigh lived with her 3-year-old brother Junior, her father, Cummings, and Croslin — but declined to describe it.

    “I can’t discuss what evidence was taken into custody,” Hardy said. “I don’t want to reveal what was found or not found.”

    Ronald Cummings, said that Croslin was watching his daughter while he was at work as a crane operator. According to Cummings, Haleigh had gotten up to use the bathroom. When she didn’t return, Croslin went to look for her and noticed the back door was open.

    “I locked doors before I left for work. My child cannot unlock the deadbolt, you have to force the door shut all the way … and she doesn’t open the door to strangers,” Cummings said.

    In addition to Croslin, Cummings and the child’s mother, Crystal Sheffield, as well as several others have been questioned in the case.

    “It is never safe to say that a family member is not a suspect,” Bowling said Wednesday. “However, all the world is a suspect right now.”

    Police have ruled out the possibility that the girl ran away.

    “This child didn’t voluntarily walk out of her home. If she did, someone took her,” Bowling said.

    “I know somebody took her. I know for a fact she didn’t wander off — she’s afraid of the dark,” Cummings told NBC’s “Today” on Thursday.

    Police said house-to-house searches of the neighborhood Wednesday found no evidence that the child wandered away.

    Police had never been called to the home in the past.

    “There have been some investigations done through the department of children and family,” Rose told FOX News on Wednesday. He didn’t elaborate.

    Sheffield’s mother, Marie, told Van Susteren that the children seemed to be doing well living with their father.

    There were still no firm leads in the case. Detectives wouldn’t say whether Croslin, Cummings or anyone else in the family were a focus of the investigation.

    Sheffield told Van Susteren that her children loved their father’s girlfriend, whom he’d been dating for 4 to 6 months. “She seemed like a really nice person, but I never sat down and had a conversation with her,” she said.

    Appearing on FOX News on Thursday, Sheffield answered “yes” when asked whether it was true that Croslin had given conflicting statements to police.

    Cummings said his girlfriend was awake and frantic after she found Haleigh was gone. But in the police report, obtained by FOX News, Cummings reportedly told officers that his “dumb bitch girlfriend” told him Haleigh was gone when he got home from work.

    “Ronald said that he did not know what Haleigh was wearing, and that all he knew was that the back door was standing open. Ronald repeatedly said that someone had taken his child and also said ‘When I find him I’ll kill him,’” police wrote in the report.

    He referred to a 9mm Beretta handgun he owns and said if authorities found his daughter’s kidnapper, “he would shoot them through the back window of the patrol car,” the police report said.

    Deputies said Thursday they’re in the process of questioning 44 registered sex offenders who live within five miles of Haleigh’s home. Not unusual, if you googled your own neighborhood you might find similiar numbers od sex offenders living near you.

    Another case of a missing child. This is getting a lot of new coverage. Lets hope it doesn’t turn out to be a repeat of the last missing girl case (Calyee Anthony) that made the headlines.

    Misty Croslin, the 17-year-old who was watching her boyfriend’s children the night 5-year-old Haleigh Cummings disappeared, explained in public what she recalls from Monday night inside the Green Lane mobile home. As hours became days following the disappearance, Croslin has been under scrutiny for being the last one to see her when she put the little girl to bed Monday.

    Authorities are calling the disappearance an abduction.

    “I don’t care what people are saying about me because I didn’t do it,” Croslin said Thursday. “I was sleeping,” she said. “I don’t know what happened.”

    Misty Croslin, the last person to see Haliegh

    Misty Croslin, the last person to see Haliegh


  • Photos in the Haliegh Cummings Case
  • Haleigh Cummings 911 Transcript