Charlotte aunt charged with abuse in death of 6-year-old given ‘sole’ custody in 2021
A Charlotte 6-year-old who weighed just 27 pounds when she died was in her aunt’s custody after her mother struggled with drug addiction, records show.
A medical examiner found Dominique Moody had a number of injuries when she died last month, including burn scars, fractures to her ribs and wounds from “prolonged sitting in urine/feces-soiled items, such as a diaper, for extensive periods of time,” according to a police affidavit.
Other records obtained by The Charlotte Observer show police visited the home five times beginning in 2022 and up to Moody’s death, including for a reported assault.
Police charged the girl’s aunt and legal guardian, Tonya McKnight, and two other women in the home with felony and misdemeanor child abuse. But prosecutors have said they might file a rare and more serious charge of murder by torture if lab results justify it.
All three women — Tonya McKnight, Moody’s adopted sister Tery’n McKnight and Susan Robinson — are in uptown’s jail.
The Charlotte Observer on Tuesday contacted Mecklenburg County’s Department of Social Services, which did not answer whether social workers had visited the home before Moody died. The Observer also filed a request for child protection records.
Mother struggled with addiction
Court records show McKnight filed for custody of the child and her sibling in 2020. The records say she is the children’s maternal aunt.
McKnight wrote in her filing that her sister asked her “to raise and care for her children… because she is unstable and not equipped to care for the children.”
The mother signed “permanent custody agreements” for both children in 2020, along with forms giving McKnight power of attorney over them.
A permanent custody order was issued in Mecklenburg County after a hearing in September 2021, granting McKnight “sole legal and physical custody” of the children.
That custody order said the children were initially placed with McKnight in 2020 by social services in Fayetteville, where the mother lived. The order describes the biological mother as struggling with drug addiction, not having a “stable residence” and engaging in prostitution.
Court records say the identity of the children’s father is unknown.
Mecklenburg County filed a complaint against the biological mother in 2024 on McKnight’s behalf over child support, court records show. The court ordered the mother to provide financial support, and the case was reopened Dec. 15 after she allegedly failed to make payments.
The Observer sent the mother a message on Wednesday, and could not reach other family members by phone that day.
The Observer’s news partner, WSOC-TV, reported that Moody’s grandmother and great-grandmother believed the system meant to keep children safe failed. They tried to get custody of Moody, the grandmother and great-grandmother told WSOC.
“They’re supposed to go in a person’s home and check,” a tearful great-grandmother, Shirley Mack, told WSOC. “They didn’t do none of it!”
Police called to house before
McKnight has lived in the home on Gwynne Hill Road since at least 2020, according to the custody records.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg police reports obtained by the Observer through a public records request show that officers have been called to the home five times since then.
In April 2022, they visited after an unnamed victim reported being assaulted. An unnamed suspect there was accused of stealing someone’s gun in June 2023. Tery’n McKnight, Moody’s adopted sister who also faces abuse charges tied to her death, reported being assaulted by an unnamed suspect in March 2024.
The Observer has requested recordings of 911 calls from the house.
Tonya McKnight faced conspiracy and assault charges in 2018, but they were dismissed by the district attorney’s office due to insufficient evidence, a spokesperson for Mecklenburg County Clerk of Superior Court Elisa Chinn-Gary confirmed in an email. Another assault charge from 2014 was tossed, too, online records said.
Ryan Oehrli covers criminal justice in the Charlotte region for The Charlotte Observer. His work is produced with financial support from the nonprofit The Just Trust. The Observer maintains full editorial control of its journalism.
This story was originally published January 1, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
