In a horrific case, a Washington mother has been sentenced to 32 years in prison for starving and torturing her eight-year-old adopted daughter to death, then transporting the child’s body more than 1,000 miles in a rented U-Haul.
Mandie Miller, 36, was sentenced by Spokane County Judge Rachelle Anderson after pleading guilty to homicide by abuse, second-degree child assault and two counts of unlawful imprisonment in the death of Meela Miller, her biological niece whom she had legally adopted.
The horror unraveled in December 2022 when Miller and her boyfriend, Aleksander Kurmoyarov, 31, drove from Washington State to Mitchell, South Dakota, with a coffin in tow.
According to the New York Post (NYP), funeral home staff grew suspicious when the couple arrived seeking burial arrangements but failed to produce proper documentation. Authorities were alerted, and soon discovered the child’s body inside a U-Haul trailer.
Investigators later determined that Meela had died months earlier, in September 2022, after enduring prolonged abuse inside the couple’s Airway Heights home. Prosecutors said the child had been starved and restrained for hours at a time. By the time officers recovered her body, she weighed just 26 pounds.
Spokane County Deputy Prosecutor Emily Sullivan told the court that home surveillance cameras captured disturbing footage, including the child being tied to a car seat with zip ties.
“The facts before this court are undisputed. They did assault her, they did starve her, they did restrain her, they did torture her, and they did kill her,” she said, as quoted by NYP.
Body kept for nearly three months
The couple allegedly kept Meela’s body in their home for nearly three months, claiming they “wanted to spend more time with her,” according to the Daily Express UK.
Judge Anderson rejected prosecutors’ recommendation of a 30-year sentence and instead imposed 32 years, the upper end of the standard range. “We’re here because a little girl was tortured, she was starved, her interests were not protected,” the judge said.
During the emotional hearing, Meela’s biological mother, Andrea Miller, who is also Mandie’s sister, condemned the abuse but extended forgiveness. “You did this with no remorse, murdering my third child, my beautiful daughter,” she said.
Miller briefly addressed the court, referencing her troubled childhood in foster care, and admitted her daughter “did not deserve any abuse or neglect.”
Kurmoyarov has also pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, assault and unlawful imprisonment. He is scheduled to be sentenced separately.
The chilling case has sparked widespread outrage, with prosecutors describing it as one of the most harrowing child abuse cases in the region’s recent memory.
