The video above and the majority of the text below is courtesy WSBTV in Atlanta’s Tony Thomas via NDN and CNN.
PEACHTREE CORNERS, Ga. — A 21-year-old woman who vanished four years ago has been found in a Georgia hotel and was severely malnourished and weighing only 59 pounds, and an infant who starved to death was in the same room.
The woman, identified as Iasia Sweeting, was reported missing in 2010.
But that’s only the beginning of a very strange case.
Gwinnett County police said 23-year-old Najaa Mcintosh has slowly started discussing what was happening in the family’s Peachtree Corners hotel room.
She and her 44-year old father Calvin both face murder, child cruelty and exploitation charges after a 15-month old baby died Tuesday of starvation.
Najaa Mcintosh, left, and Calvin Mcintosh, right, face charges of child cruelty, exploitation and murder. Image courtesy WSB TV via NDN.
“It was under his direction that if anyone was disobedient in the house, she is to deprive them of food,” said Cpl. Ed Ritter of the Gwinnett County Police Department.
11 Alive in Atlanta reports Calvin Mcintosh also faces charges that include cruelty to a physically disabled adult, rape, incest and aggravated sodomy. 11 Alive reports the man is the father of three of the children, two of whom were conceived with his biological daughter and the other with Sweeting. Click here for more from 11 Alive.
Investigators said three children in room 310 were also malnourished.
“We believe that if there wasn’t an intervention now, she would eventually die, and fairly soon,” Ritter said.
Authorities said the family is part of the Nuwaubian Nation of Moors, a religion with a spotty history in Georgia.
Its Putnam County compound was torn down after founder Dwight York was convicted of child molestation and tax evasion in 2004.
Police said that inside room 310 they found a lot of literature on ritualistic behavior and the Nuwabians.
“The children speak in a different language, they don’t speak English,” Ritter said. “They were raised on this language which is part of the Nuwabian Nation of Moors.”
