A Texas man has confessed to causing the death of his 8-year-old daughter by forcing her to jump on a trampoline in extreme heat. Daniel Schwarz, 48, made his daughter, Jaylin Schwarz, continue jumping on the trampoline despite the surface temperature reaching around 110 degrees. The incident occurred in August 2020 at their residence in Odessa, Texas.
Schwarz pleaded guilty to manslaughter charges on Friday and was sentenced to 18 years in prison as part of a plea deal. The Ector County District Attorney’s Office announced the agreement on social media, noting that Schwarz’s wife, Ashley Schwarz, had been convicted of capital murder in May 2023 for her role in the incident.
The District Attorney’s office stated that the case originated from an incident on August 29, 2020, when emergency services responded to a medical situation involving an 8-year-old girl. Investigations later revealed that Daniel and Ashley Schwarz had punished their daughter by making her jump on the trampoline for an extended period without food or water.
According to law enforcement, Jaylin was denied breakfast and any food until she had finished jumping on the trampoline. Further inquiries revealed that the child was also not allowed to drink water because she was not jumping.
As reported earlier, police were alerted to a medical emergency on Locust Avenue. They obtained a search warrant and checked the local temperatures, finding the trampoline’s surface temperature to be around 110 degrees and the ground temperature to be approximately 150 degrees. The autopsy results indicated that Jaylin died from dehydration, and her death was classified as a homicide.
Local CBS affiliate KMGH reported in 2020 that Daniel and Ashley Schwarz were not Jaylin’s biological parents but were her legal guardians. They also had custody of Jaylin’s sister at the time of her death and were engaged in a custody dispute with Jaylin’s biological mother, Alysha Anderton, according to court records obtained by The Dallas Morning News. Anderton expressed her grief on social media, stating that she had not seen her daughter in over three years and lamenting the missed opportunity to tell her how much she loved her.