Doomsday cult leader who ordered two young sisters to be starved and left to die in hot car jailed for 64 years
A DOOMSDAY cult leader who ordered two young girls to be starved and left in a hot car while the group awaited an apocalypse has been sentenced to 64 years in prison.
Madani Ceus, of , was given two back-to-back sentences, worth 32 years each, after the sisters died in 2017.
The girls — Hannah Marshal, eight, and Makayla Roberts, 10 — were found dead inside of a car that was parked near a farm in .
believed the girls were dead for several weeks when their bodies were found in mid-September of that year.
The girls’ mother, Nashika Bramble, was charged with in the case and has been serving a life sentence in their deaths.
A forensic pathologist who conducted their autopsied said it’s “quite likely” they died of dehydration, malnourishment, and hyperthermia.
But, the doctor said he couldn’t definitively say how they died because their bodies were found in such poor condition.
, Ceus ordered the followers of her “spiritual” group — including Bramble — to lock the girls in a car without food or water because Ceus felt they were “unclean.”
The group was apparently waiting for an apocalypse.
The owner of the farm where the girls were found, Frederick “Alec” Blair, reached a plea deal in May 2018 for his role.
The newest member of the group, he was charged with two counts of child abuse resulting in death and being an accessory, and as part of a plea deal, prosecutors dropped the child abuse charges in return for pleading guilty to the accessory charge.
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Two other group members were each charged with two counts of child abuse resulting in death and single accessory count.
Blair told investigators he met the “cult” group at a gas station and invited them to use his land — and soon joined them living there in tents and cars, according to court documents.
Ceus was charged with felony child abuse resulting in death.