Jury recommends more than 50 years in prison for Missouri mom whose two children died in hot car

LIBERTY, Mo. — A jury has recommended that a Missouri woman whose two young daughters died inside a hot car in 2018 be sentenced to more than 50 years in prison.

A Clay County jury found Jenna Boedecker guilty on Friday of two counts of second-degree murder, four counts of endangering the welfare of a child and two misdemeanor counts.

The same jury recommended Monday that Boedecker be sentenced to 22 years each for the two second-degree murder convictions and a total of nine years for the endangering the welfare of a child convictions.

Prosecutors alleged that Boedecker said she put her 2-year daughter and 8-week-old daughters in her Jeep while she argued with her husband and then fell asleep at their rural Kearney home on July 3, 2018. She found them unresponsive the next morning and took them to a neighbor's home for help but emergency responders declared the girls dead.

Evidence during the trial showed Boedecker had about two times the therapeutic amount of Xanax in her system the day her daughters were found, WDAF-TV reported.

Clay County Prosecutors Zachary Thompson said evidence also showed Boedecker had contact with law enforcement the day before the girls died about a separate incident of leaving the children in the vehicle.

A hearing on any motion for a new trial and sentencing is scheduled for Aug. 3.