ST. GEORGE — A St. George woman has pled guilty to attempting to murder her then 8-year-old son at the St. George Motel 6 in 2021.
But Washington County’s lead attorney says because of Megan Michelle Stewart’s mental illness at the time of the incident and the victim’s wishes, they will not be recommending prison time beyond the time she has served at Purgatory Correctional Facility and an additional year.
As part of a plea deal, Stewart, 29, pled guilty on Friday before Judge John Walton in 5th District Court via video from Washington County Purgatory to a first-degree count of attempted murder. All other charges, including a second-degree child abuse offense, were dropped.
Stewart admits in the plea agreement to attempting to suffocate her son with a pillow at Motel 6 on 1000 East on Aug. 26, 2021, then later stabbing him in the neck with scissors. The stabbing drew a large police response to the motel.
At the time, police said an employee at the Motel 6 told officers that she initially saw the child around 9 a.m. running through an alley between two buildings at the motel, screaming for help and yelling that his mother was trying to suffocate him.
The employee told police that Stewart followed a short distance behind the boy and told the employee, “Don’t worry, he just got his butt whooped,” and the child returned to the room with his mother. Two hours later, a housekeeper saw the child outside the room, claiming his mom wanted to “kill him.” The housekeeper told the child to return to the room, then contacted the clerk, who called 911 after seeing the room’s window and door closed.
The clerk returned to the room after calling dispatch, police said, and found the door open and blood all over the room and the child lying on the bed. The employee, seeing the position of the child, the blood and the boy’s purple complexion, told police that she thought the child was dead.
Police later arrested Stewart after she was seen walking away from the motel, and the police report stated that Stewart admitted she was with the child in the room, tried to suffocate him with a pillow, then stabbed him in the throat with scissors saying she “had to” kill him for “Satan” or “Mother Mary.”
Stewart faces a sentencing hearing on Aug. 3 at the St. George Courthouse where she faces three years to life in Utah State Prison. But Washington County Attorney Eric Clarke told St. George News that this is a case where the rehabilitation function of justice supersedes just punishing the defendant.
“This is a sticky case because … she admitted that she tried to smother and stabbed a child victim,” Clarke said. “The fact of the matter is that mental illness clearly played a huge role. The lack of a criminal history plays a big role. It’s not that often that we see an attempted murder charge on someone with such a minimal criminal history.”
Also playing a role, Clarke said, are the wishes of the victim himself who is now 10, in good health and with a family member.
“The child victim is a little older now and the victim doesn’t want her to go to prison,” Clarke said. “There’s obviously a lot to that. It’s actually kind of a cool story that I can’t get into on the record. But we feel like what we are doing, what we know what we’re doing, is what the victim wants.”
Since the August 2021 stabbing, Stewart has appeared for several competency hearings via video from purgatory in Walton’s St. George Courthouse courtroom. During that time, she has been receiving psychological help, according to court documents.
Other conditions of the agreement include 48 months of probation for Stewart and no unsupervised contact with the victim.
Clarke said rehabilitating people who commit crimes can play just as much a role in making the community safe as just locking them up.
“If we lock people up and they come out and they’re just immediately committing the same thing because they haven’t been rehabilitated, then we’re not improving public safety,” Clarke said. “For us to agree to not do prison … on this type of a charge is not normal, and we are confident that it was an anomalous incident and that she’s taken steps and that it won’t happen again.”
Washington County has been in the process of undertaking a strategy of trying to get help for those who commit crimes because of mental illness, rather than just incarcerating them.
A receiving center, now known as the Crisis Stabilization Center, is expected to open early next year near the Washington County Purgatory in Hurricane, where local officers can take people exhibiting mental issues and substance abuse for treatment and help, rather than just taking them for an observational hold in jail or the hospital.
“We give people in criminal justice consequences, whether that’s incarceration or fines and penalties. One is to punish the bad behavior so that people know that if you do a bad act, you’re going to do the time, and the other is to rehabilitate the person,” Clarke said. “When people are committing crimes due to mental health issues, it doesn’t necessarily make sense to lock them up because they didn’t know or understand the bad act or the degree.”
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