Day two of the trial for Alexandra Ward, the mother of three-year-old Amoura Smallwood who died in February 2023 after being brutally beaten by Ward’s then-boyfriend, continued in Whitley Circuit Court on Wednesday.
Ward, 22, faces charges of complicity to commit murder and complicity to commit first-degree strangulation in connection to Smallwood’s death.
Smallwood died on Feb. 19, 2023, from blunt force injuries to the head and body due to non-accidental injuries. Those injuries were inflicted upon Smallwood by Jordan Taylor, 24, of Corbin, who Ward left in care of Smallwood and another infant child despite only knowing him for just a few weeks.
On the day she died, Smallwood had been in the sole care of Taylor since approximately 8:30 a.m.
Taylor entered a guilty plea to charges of murder, first-degree sodomy and first-degree strangulation in October 2024. He has since been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Wednesday’s proceedings focused heavily on testimony from medical professionals, including those who personally attended to Smallwood while she was being treated in Baptist Health Corbin’s emergency room and the medical examiner who later performed Smallwood’s autopsy.
Among the witnesses prosecutors called to the stand Wednesday was Dr. Stephen Ford, who was the attending physician in the emergency room the day Smallwood died.
Smallwood was transported to Baptist Health Corbin by Whitley County EMS, who had responded to Ward’s home following a 911 call from Taylor. According to prior testimony, Taylor told first responders that Smallwood had fallen off a futon approximately an hour and a half before placing the call and had stopped breathing.
Ford testified that Smallwood was presented to the emergency room as a pediatric cardiac arrest. As the attending physician, he was charged with doing the initial examination of Smallwood as a medical team worked to resuscitate her using a combination of meds, CPR and bag-valve mask ventilation.
According to Ford, Smallwood was covered in “layers of bruising,” which he said were all in various stages of healing. Ford provided the court with a brief explanation of how bruises mature, stating that older bruises tend to have a yellowish-brown color, while newer bruises can present as a deeper purple to blue color.
With the varied color of Smallwood’s bruising, Ford testified that her injuries were unlikely to have occurred from a single incident as Taylor had claimed in his 911 call.
“This indicates that the injuries occurred over a period of time,” said Ford.
In addition to the obvious bruising, Ford testified that Smallwood had no neurological responses when she arrived at the emergency room.
Ford said that Smallwood’s pupils were fixed and dilated, and that they did not respond to light or by means of accommodation, which he said often indicates brain death.
The medical team were eventually able to restart Smallwood’s heart for a brief time and a series of CT scans were performed as air transport was en route to transfer Smallwood to the University of Kentucky Medical Center in Lexington. The scans indicated that Smallwood had suffered from multiple intracranial bleeds.
Smallwood’s injuries were consistent with severe head trauma, according to Ford’s testimony, which was akin to a patient who has experienced a blunt force to the head during something like a car accident or being hit with a bat.
Smallwood was never flown out from Baptist Health Corbin, as she again coded while on a transport table and was soon pronounced deceased.
Ford testified that he is tasked with speaking to members of a deceased person’s family after they pass away, which required him notify Ward, who was outside the hospital smoking at the time, following Smallwood’s death.
“She immediately blamed me and the hospital,” said Ford. “I was asked to leave.”
Prosecutors also brought Dr. Sarah Maines to the stand Wednesday, who is a forensics pathologist with the Kentucky Medical Examiner’s Office. Maines performed the autopsy on Smallwood following her death.
Much like Ford, Maines’ job began with an external examination of Smallwood’s body, which she said was “time-consuming.”
“There was a lot to document in this case,” said Maines.
Maines also noted the number of bruises covering Smallwood’s body, many of which were in locations that are not associated with accidental injuries. In total, Maines documented over 70 individual injuries just to the exterior of Smallwood’s body, including bruising to the inside of her thighs and behind her ears, both of which Maines stated are not common from normal run-of-the-mill injuries.
However, some of the injuries to Smallwood’s body, while in areas that tend to be susceptible to common injury, were anything but normal.
Prosecutors presented jurors with photos of Smallwood’s body taken from her autopsy. Among the bruising shown on one of Smallwood’s arms was a large, oval-shaped mark that appeared to be from a human bite. There were also multiple injuries to her face, particularly to the right side, which had a large gash and dark bruising around her eye.
Information was also gathered from inside Smallwood’s mouth. Photos detailed bruising to the skin inside Smallwood’s mouth as well as rough marks where the skin should be smooth. Maines noted that Smallwood’s frenulum, the flap of skip under one’s top lip, was torn. Tearing of the frenulum is generally only seen in cases of trauma to that area, according to Maines.
A forensic odontologist, a specialist that applies their dental knowledge to legal investigations, reviewed Smallwood’s mouth. Maines testified that the odontologist’s report indicated that the inside of Smallwood’s lips and cheeks had multiple lacerations that were inconsistent with any type of natural or accidental cause, suggesting that there was likely some type of external trauma caused by a blunt force.
Maines also examined Smallwood’s brain during the autopsy. Jurors were presented with photos of that process as well. The photos depicted multiple dark, blackish areas among Smallwood’s brain.
“That dark material is blood,” said Maines. “It shouldn’t be there.”
Maines testified that the consistency of the blood was partially congealed, indicating that it had been there for some time. Smallwood’s brain also showed obvious signs of swelling.
The obvious damage to Smallwood’s brain led Maines to bring in another specialist: Dr. Pamela Sequeira, a neuropathologist.
Sequeira also testified during Wednesday’s proceedings, though her testimony was presented via a pre-recorded video as she is currently out of the country participating in Doctors Without Borders.
According to Sequeira’s testimony, a three-year-old’s brain typically weighs anywhere from 900 to 1,000 grams. When she received Smallwood’s brain for examination, it weighed in excess of 1,100 grams, equating to approximately 120 percent of its normal size.
“When the brain swells within a compact space [such as the skull]…it has nowhere to go other than the spinal column and the middle of the brain,” said Sequeira.
When the brain swells into the middle, it creates what Sequeira referred to as a midline shift, or what is also known as a herniation of the brain.
“Clearly, that is what has happened here,” said Sequeira.
Such swelling typically also causes a loss of blood, which Sequeira also found during her examination.
The report that Sequeira ultimately submitted to Maines noted that the damage seen to Smallwood’s brain was not consistent with a chronic issue and was likely caused by a traumatic event.
Part of Maines job is to determine a cause and manner of death. In the case of Smallwood’s death, Maines determined the cause to be from blunt force trauma to the head and body due to non-accidental injuries and the manner of death to be homicide.
Ward’s trial resumed this morning (Thursday).
Commonwealth’s Attorney Ronnie Bowling told the News Journal earlier this week that he expects to wrap up his presentation of evidence sometime Friday.
Ward’s attorney, John Combs, is expected to begin presenting his side of the case beginning Monday. The trial is still set to take approximately two weeks to finish.
Ward currently remains jailed in the Whitley County Detention Center as her trial continues.
