A 34-year-old California woman has been sentenced to 15 years and 8 months in prison after pleading no contest to manslaughter and child abuse in the death of her 8-year-old daughter. Samantha Johnson forced Sophia Mason to live in a backyard shed before the girl's body was found decomposing in a bathtub. The sentencing came as part of a plea deal that dropped a murder charge.
Samantha Johnson of Merced, California, received her sentence on Thursday following the March 2022 death of her daughter, Sophia Mason. Authorities discovered Sophia's decomposing body in a bathtub on March 11, 2022, after she had been reported missing. Johnson had last seen her alive on February 10, 2022, when she cleaned feces from the girl's body before leaving her alone with boyfriend Dhante Jackson, according to investigators cited by the Merced Sun-Star. Johnson heard a thud shortly after but did not search for Sophia, assuming she had run away after Jackson claimed the girl wanted nothing to do with her mother. Officers from the Hayward Police Department arrested Johnson on March 10, 2022, and a subsequent search uncovered the body. Jackson, who faced similar charges, pleaded guilty to a lesser offense last October and was released with credit for time served. Prior to the abuse, Johnson had left Sophia with family members shortly after birth; her grandmother raised the girl until Johnson regained custody in 2021. Over the next 15 months, there were at least seven reports of abuse, but social services workers did not intervene or notify police, violating state law, the San Jose Mercury News reported. Sophia's aunts expressed outrage in victim impact statements. Emerald Johnson wrote, 'This isn't justice. Sophia didn't get to live her life.' Lynn Linnen told the defendant, 'You failed. Instead of protecting her, you allowed her to suffer and die.'