PARK HILLS, Mo. – A community is still searching for answers after a three-year-old died at a Park Hills daycare in May.
About six weeks later, pieces of a memorial stand outside of Poppy’s Playhouse 2 with signs demanding, “Justice of Conrad.”
“We as a family thus far have not had any updates from anybody,” Lacie Hardie, Conrad Ashcraft’s aunt, said.
Conrad was found dead at Poppy’s Playhouse 2 on May 16.
“Emotionally, it’s probably the hardest thing that we will ever have to do in our lives,” Hardie said. “I understand that justice does take time. But justice delayed is justice denied.”
So far there have been no arrests or criminal charges. has not provided any update.
FOX 2 News has called and e-mailed the special prosecutor on the case, Trisha Stefanski, multiple times over the past month and have never heard back. An official cause of death has not been announced, either.
A state licensing inspection determined that Conrad was laid down for a nap under an 18-pound weighted blanket. He was found dead about four hours later. But the St. Francois County coroner will not say if that is what caused the death. He told FOX 2 that he is still waiting for autopsy and toxicology results, but we are “getting close.”
The daycare’s owner spoke with FOX 2 off the record but will not go on the record due to pending litigation.
“We just want to keep fighting as long as we can and will do it until our last breath,” Hardie said.
Poppy’s Playhouse 2 has an appeal hearing coming up later this month over its license and ability to operate. The state revoked the facility’s license shortly after Conrad’s death.
