Mom charged in daughter’s death months after she’s found dead in yard, SC police say

Bailey Aldridge
·1 min read

A South Carolina woman has been charged with manslaughter in the August death of her daughter, police said.

Ayla Franklin, 22, was found face down and unresponsive in the front yard of a home on Irby Street in Woodruff on Aug. 7 and was pronounced dead, according to a news release from the Woodruff Police Department.

Police said they investigated the case along with the Spartanburg County Coroner’s Office and the Spartanburg County Solicitor’s Office and later “upgraded” it from a death investigation to homicide.

On Friday, Franklin’s mother, Heather Wessel, was arrested and charged with manslaughter, police said. She was taken to the Spartanburg County Detention Center where she will have a bond hearing.

No other information about the case had been released as of Monday morning.

Woodruff is in Upstate South Carolina, about 30 miles east of Greenville and about 80 miles northwest of Columbia.

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