Tamara Banks was sentenced in the death of her daughter Karmity Hoeb after her mom fed her a nearly all Mountain Dew diet. (Courtroom screenshot from WXIX-TV/YouTube; victim’s photo from her obituary)
An Ohio mother mixed baby formula with Mountain Dew, killing her 4-year-old daughter from diabetes and dissolving her teeth.
Tamara Banks, 41, was sentenced to between at least nine years and 13.5 years in prison this week after pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter in the death of her daughter, Karmity Hoeb, in January 2022. The little girl’s father, Christopher Hoeb, 53, also pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and is set to be sentenced on June 11.
“It’s hard to be a good parent but you expect at least mediocre parents, everybody should expect that,” the judge said during Friday’s hearing, the newspaper reported. “Not knowing what to do is not an excuse.”
“I thought I was taking care of her,” Tamara answered.
Clermont County Assistant Prosecutor Clay Tharp recounted the suffering in the short life of the little girl in front of Clermont County Common Pleas Judge Victor Haddad during a court hearing, which local affiliate WKRC-TV posted audio of on Facebook last July.
“Just her overall care was so poor that it resulted in [Karmity’s] death. Her death was absolutely terrible. She also suffered, one of the main indicators we have of this is [Karmity] has what’s called ‘baby bottle caries,’” he told the judge, the station reported. “It’s sort of tooth decay caused by drinking a sugary liquid, usually out of a delivery system, out of a bottle. Well, it turns out this 4-year-old was drinking Mountain Dew out of a bottle every day, so much so that it rotted all of her teeth out.”
The case came to light when the girl suffered a “serious medical issue” in January 2022, and her mom only called 911 after Karmity turned blue and stopped breathing, the Cincinnati Inquirer reported, citing court documents. The little girl died at a hospital on Jan. 25, 2022, from a diabetes-related brain injury and being fed a sugary drink through a bottle that dissolved her teeth. She was never taken to the dentist, the paper reported.
The parents were indicted last summer on several counts including murder, involuntary manslaughter and endangering children.
Karmity’s obituary said she was a happy girl.
“She also loved looking at herself in the mirror because she knew how beautiful and special she was,” the eulogy said. “Smart and Vibrant. The camera loved her almost as much as she loved smiling real big and saying cheese. Each day she woke up full of joy and love. Every day she was playing with her Mickey buddies and racing her cars. She touched everyone that ever laid eyes on her or spent any time with her. She will always be remembered as our daughter, our guardian angel now.”
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