REMEMBERING JADIEN

Jadien Harvey was two years old when he died.

He was the twin brother of Jaylan Harvey and lived with his mother, Ashley Harvey, and his siblings.

At two years old, Jadien was still a toddler learning his way through the world beside his twin brother. He and Jaylan were being potty trained, one of those ordinary stages of childhood that should have become little more than a family memory as the boys grew older.

The day before Jadien died, someone who regularly cared for the children remembered him as healthy and active. He had a cold, but he was otherwise behaving normally, walking, playing and doing the things expected of a little boy his age.

Within a day, he was gone.

Jadien deserves to be remembered not simply as the two year old at the center of a murder case, but as a son, a brother and a twin whose childhood should have continued far beyond July 2012.

JADIEN’S STORY

Jadien lived with his mother, Ashley Harvey, his twin brother Jaylan, his older brother Ashton Capers, another sibling, and Ashley’s boyfriend, Kemra Matthews.

The children knew Kemra as “Kem.”

Kemra regularly cared for the children when Ashley was working.

On July 11, 2012, Ashley left for work, leaving the children in Kemra’s care.

During the morning, Kemra briefly took the children to the apartment of Ashley’s cousin, where relatives sometimes helped watch them.

Ashton was ill and repeatedly vomiting.

Jadien was still able to walk normally.

Later that afternoon, a relative visited the family’s apartment.

Jadien was standing in a corner.

Kemra said the toddler was being punished because he had defecated in his pants.

The twins were in the process of being potty trained.

Sometime afterward, Jadien suffered a devastating assault.

At approximately 3:00 that afternoon, Kemra arrived at the apartment complex leasing office carrying Jadien.

The little boy was unresponsive.

The leasing manager called 911.

When paramedics arrived, Jadien was in cardiac arrest and showed no signs of life.

He was transported to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Jadien had suffered severe blunt force trauma to his head.

The medical examiner found a skull fracture and other traumatic injuries. There was also bleeding in his abdomen caused by blunt force trauma and bleeding involving the optic nerve consistent with violent acceleration and impact.

The head injuries were so severe that medical experts concluded Jadien would have immediately become unconscious, or at minimum profoundly lethargic and unable to walk, talk, eat or play normally.

Investigators also discovered a hole in a wall of the apartment.

It had not been there when Ashley left for work that morning.

Jadien was not the only injured child in the home.

His older brother Ashton was also taken to the hospital.

Doctors discovered that Ashton had suffered a perforated intestine, a fractured leg, an injury to his lower spine and other injuries consistent with physical abuse.

Ashton survived.

During forensic interviews, he described Kemra hurting both him and Jadien.

At trial, Ashton again identified Kemra as the person who hurt them.

Jadien’s death was caused by blunt force trauma to his head.

He was two years old.

SYSTEM FAILURES & WARNING SIGNS

Jadien and his siblings were already known to Georgia’s Division of Family and Children Services before his death.

A DFACS case involving the family had been opened following a complaint in April 2012.

Most troublingly, a DFACS caseworker visited the family on July 9, 2012.

That was only two days before Jadien was killed.

The caseworker testified that the children appeared to be in good health during that visit.

That detail makes Jadien’s case complicated.

Unlike cases in which a child was visibly injured during a welfare visit and those injuries were ignored, the evidence at Kemra’s trial established that Jadien was behaving normally immediately before the day he died.

A caregiver who saw Jadien on July 10 remembered that although he had a cold, he was otherwise healthy and participating in normal activities.

The medical evidence also showed that Jadien’s fatal head injuries were acute. They would have immediately left him unable to continue behaving like a healthy toddler.

Still, his death raised serious questions about Georgia’s child protection system.

Jadien died while his family had an open DFACS history and only two days after a child welfare worker had been inside the home.

His death became part of a broader public examination of children who died despite their families having recent contact with Georgia child protection authorities.

Jadien’s case demonstrates one of the most difficult realities of protecting young children.

A welfare visit is only a moment in time.

A child can appear healthy during one visit and still be living in circumstances where danger exists after the worker leaves.

Two days after a caseworker saw Jadien alive and apparently healthy, he was dead.

JUSTICE FOR JADIEN

Kemra Matthews was charged in connection with Jadien’s death and the serious injuries inflicted upon Ashton.

A Clayton County grand jury indicted him in February 2013 on numerous charges, including felony murder, aggravated assault, aggravated battery and first degree cruelty to children.

His case went to trial in March 2014.

The jury heard testimony from family members, medical experts, investigators and Ashton.

They also saw recordings of Ashton’s forensic interviews.

The jury found Kemra guilty on every charge submitted to it.

On March 28, 2014, Kemra was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for felony murder.

The court also imposed seven concurrent 20 year sentences for additional felony convictions that did not merge into the murder conviction.

Kemra appealed.

On May 30, 2017, the Supreme Court of Georgia unanimously affirmed his convictions.

Kemra Matthews

Relationship to Jadien: Mother’s Boyfriend

Conviction: Felony murder; aggravated assault; aggravated battery; first degree cruelty to children

Sentence: Life without the possibility of parole, plus concurrent 20 year sentences for additional felony convictions

FOREVER REMEMBERED

Jadien had a twin.

That means from the beginning of his life, there was another little boy growing beside him.

Jaylan and Jadien should have shared milestones.

They should have grown out of potty training together.

There should have been birthdays with two children turning another year older.

Two first days of school.

Two sets of school pictures.

Arguments between brothers.

Inside jokes.

Different personalities emerging from two little boys who began life together.

Instead, Jaylan had a twin brother for only two years.

The surviving records tell us about the final hours of Jadien’s life in extraordinary detail.

They tell us where he stood in the apartment.

They tell us about the injuries doctors found.

They tell us what his brother witnessed.

They tell us what jurors decided and what sentence a judge imposed.

But those records cannot tell us who Jadien would have become.

A murder conviction could punish the man responsible for his death.

It could not restore what was taken from Jadien or from the siblings who were supposed to grow up with him.

Jadien Harvey was a little boy.

He was Ashley’s son.

He was Jaylan’s twin brother.

He was part of a family before his name became part of a court decision.

His life lasted only two years, but its value was never measured by its length.

Abuse Angels remembers Jadien Harvey.

Remembered. Honored. Never Forgotten.