Haunting texts show how mum and grandma plotted to kill four children

The father of four children who were killed by their grandmother and mother in a New York apartment has said that the two of them ‘deserve a special place in hell’.

Amy Steadman, 64, her daughter Sarah Myers, 44, and children Harper Harmon, 13, Hudson Harmon, 11, and 10-year-olds Gavin Harmon and Gracelynn Harmon were found dead at Steadman’s home in Mechanicville, New York on June 23, just days before they were due to travel to Utah to stay with dad Brady Harmon.

According to the authorities, who discovered the bodies, three of the children were fatally poisoned, while 10-year-old Gavin had been stabbed, with injuries indicating he had tried to protect himself during the attack.

In a harrowing update to the case this week, Mechanicville police chief WIlliam Rabbitt told reporters that the two women ‘conspired in carrying out the murders of the four children before taking their own lives’.

A handwritten confession signed by Steadman was found inside the property, Rabbitt said in a press conference.

Speaking in the wake of the new development, Harmon told News10: ‘I knew my kids were murdered. And then I know those two are the ones that did it.

‘My kids suffered. To poison them and also to stab them — there’s a special place in hell for people like that.’

According to reports, mum Myers had been locked in a custody battle with Harmon, who had not seen his children in person since 2019.

He had been planning to take them home with him for the summer but Myers had been due in court for a custody hearing on June 29 amid claims she had not been sticking to the parenting plan.

She claimed on social media that she was a victim of domestic violence — a claim Harmon stringently denies — and shared a GoFundMe created by a friend weeks before her death which said she needed to raise money to travel to Utah for a custody battle, and to find a lawyer.

Investigators have also revealed new details of the note which was found at the scene, saying that ‘the author accepts responsibility for what occurred and states that they believed killing the children was the only way to keep them safe from alleged abuse in Utah’.

They added: ‘The author also claimed that Sarah Myers had done everything she could and that no one would help her, and acknowledged that the events did not unfold as they planned’.

Investigators also recovered a series of handwritten papers that appeared to have been written by Sarah Myers.

Rabbit said: ‘Although those writings were unsigned, the author repeatedly referred to “my babies”, expressed anger toward the Utah family court system, made allegations that she and the children had been abused while living in Utah, and complained that she had been unable to obtain legal representation.

‘Whatever [Myers and Steadman] believed justified their actions, the deliberate murder of four children cannot be described as protection.’

He added that police could not independently verify any allegations of abuse against Myers or her children.

Further distressing revelations revealed that Steadman visited several pharmacies in the days leading up to the killings, and had exchanged text messages with her daughter about the plot.

These included ‘discussions regarding obtaining medications, where the murders would occur, how those medications would be administered, how the children would be brought together, what they would be told and how suspicion could be avoided’.

‘In one exchange, Sarah Myers instructed Amy Steadman that the medications should be administered between 10.30am and noon so they could be finished before a scheduled telephone call at 6pm,’ Rabbitt explained.

The messages also included exchanges between the two women when, as Rabbitt explained, ‘the children failed to respond in the manner that Steadman and Myers had anticipated’.

A message was then sent saying: ‘It’s not working, we need another option’.

Daughter Gracelynn sent her own message complaining that her stomach was hurting and saying ‘Why would you do that? You both won’t let me puke’, prompting Steadman to send one final horrifying text that evening which read simply: ‘Gracie is aware’.

Rabbitt said: ‘Those communications are important because they document far more than planning. They show that Steadman and Myers were communicating and coordinating while the murders were taking place.’

The grandmother’s chilling internet search history included ‘searches about medication reactions, the effects of insulin on non-diabetics and the Utah court system’, as well as information on ‘the most fatal place to be stabbed’.

Harmon has since said that the police findings confirmed his ‘worst fears’, adding: ‘My kids were scared and frightened. And they were maliciously attacked.’

He raised the alarm with police after the children missed a scheduled video call with him on June 13, with the six bodies later found after a neighbor, Stephanie Sweeney, called the police to request a welfare check, saying she had not heard from them in days.

The US Sun reported that Sweeney saw flies gathering around the window of Steadman’s apartment, and claimed she could ‘smell death’ when she attempted to visit.

Police in Utah later broke the devastating news of the deaths to Harmon at his home.

‘I have been fighting for so long to be able to have access to them, fighting so long to be part of their lives and show them there’s something different,’ he told Spectrum News 1.

‘Almost to that finish line, have my legs cut out from me and gutted because someone decided to take my kids away from me.’