The mother of slain Florida teen Madeline Soto reportedly told police she knew her older boyfriend had been “seducing and abusing” the girl before he was charged with her murder.
The body of Madeline Soto, 13, was discovered in rural Osceola County on March 1, four days after she was first reported missing after failing to show up to school in Kissimmee on February 26.
In an interview with detectives the day Madeline's body was discovered, her mother, Jennifer Soto, said she believed her boyfriend, 37-year-old Stephen Stearns, was “guilty” of the girl's murder, according to the release. Supplemental reporting obtained by FOX35 Orlando.
When asked why she believed Stearns killed her daughter, Jennifer Soto explained that she knew “he was seducing and abusing my daughter.”
At the time of the interview, Stearns was in jail on unrelated charges relating to child sexual abuse material police found on his phone during the investigation into Madeleine's disappearance.
Stearns claimed he last saw the girl on the morning of Feb. 26 when he dropped her off near the middle school.
Jennifer Soto told detectives that Stearns was a “master liar” but that she initially didn't want to believe he was involved in her daughter's disappearance, FOX35 reported.
The concerned mother changed her mind after officers showed her photographic evidence of Madeline's body, believed to have been found collapsed in Stearns' car on the day he claimed he had abandoned her near the school.
When detectives told Jennifer Soto that the investigation had changed from a missing persons case to a homicide case, she “was quiet for a moment and then began to cry,” according to the report.
When investigators asked her if she believed Stearns killed her daughter, she acknowledged, “At this point, I do.”
According to an arrest affidavit released in March, Stearns allegedly began sexually abusing Madeline when she was 11 years old.
In the latest reports, authorities claim that Jennifer Soto admitted to prioritizing her boyfriend over her daughter's safety.
At one point, she allegedly told officers that “the 'sex' thing” – Stearns' sexual abuse of Madeline – was “not an evil thing.” However, she acknowledged that killing her daughter was “an evil thing.” According to Click Orlando.
“She had already admitted to being victimized and her emotions appeared to me to be fake,” one detective's evaluation read.
In an earlier interview on the second day of the investigation, Jennifer Soto also admitted to letting Stearns share her bed with their young child.
“Sometimes, when I really want to get a good night's sleep, I send the kids upstairs. [to sleep together]”, “I was shocked,” Soto said in the recording obtained by WFTV9..
“But usually we sleep together in a king-sized bed, all three of us. Or sometimes Stefan goes upstairs and we share a bed by himself. So it really depends on our schedules that night and what we're doing,” she explained.
After Stearns and Soto broke up, she told police she allowed him to continue living with her and her daughter because she “trusted” him.
On Feb. 29, police interviewed a woman who had a brief relationship with Stearns in 2022.
According to Click Orlando, the unnamed woman told investigators she ended the relationship because Stearns insisted on returning to Soto's house to sleep every night and that mother and daughter could not sleep without him.
On March 7, two of Jennifer Soto's roommates told detectives they heard “noises” coming from the second-floor bedroom where Stearns and Madeline were believed to be sleeping the night before Soto disappeared, the outlet added.
Jennifer Soto was believed to have been sleeping in another room at the time.
Despite the mother's apparent admissions to abusing and killing her daughter, authorities have repeatedly said they do not intend to charge anyone else in the case.
On the morning of Madeleine's disappearance, Stearns was captured on video throwing items into a trash can on the property she shared with the mother and daughter.
Authorities later counted Madeline's backpack and school laptop in the trash can.
Stearns was charged with Madeline's murder on April 24.
Autopsy results obtained last month revealed the boy's cause and manner of death was homicide by strangulation.
Stearns also faces 40 counts of unlawful possession of material depicting a child engaging in sexual conduct (10 or more images), five counts of sexual assault of a child between the ages of 12 and 18, seven counts of lewd or lascivious conduct and eight counts of sexual assault of a child under the age of 12.
He is due to appear in court for trial on October 14th.
