Inset: Kymberli Bowden (High Point Police Department). Background: The Guilford County Jail in High Point, N.C. (Google Maps).
A North Carolina woman is behind bars for the death of her 13-year-old daughter, Tar Heel State authorities announced this week.
Kymberli Bowden, 45, stands accused of one count of first-degree murder for the October 2025 death of the girl, who is not being named, according to the High Point Police Department.
Bowden was previously arrested on Oct. 30, 2025, in connection with the case and charged with two counts of felony child abuse and one count of concealment of death. Bowden has remained incarcerated since.
The investigation began when officers were asked to conduct a welfare check at a residence on East Farris Avenue in High Point, a large city located roughly 17 miles southwest of Greensboro.
Inside, police found the 13-year-old girl dead and a 13-year-old boy malnourished, according to law enforcement.
Police alleged at the time that Bowden "failed to provide adequate food and medical care" to her daughter, resulting in serious bodily injury and death, according to an arrest warrant obtained by Winston-Salem-based NBC affiliate WXII.
The girl's death was ruled a homicide, and an autopsy found the cause was acute necrotizing pneumonia and inanition — or exhaustion, malnutrition or starvation — in the setting of caregiver neglect, WXII reported.
Investigators also alleged the inside of the residence was filthy.
As for the boy, law enforcement said Bowden "allowed him to remain in a residence filled with trash, rotting food and unsanitary conditions," which resulted in the boy having "serious psychological injury and mental harm constituting serious bodily injury."
But authorities say warning signs had piled up.
In all, law enforcement made six service calls to the defendant's residence the month the girl died, High Point-based Fox affiliate WGHP and Greensboro-based CBS affiliate WFMY reported.
Earlier that month, a woman called police to decline a welfare check that authorities had been asked to perform over an unusual lack of sounds from children, police said.
On the day the girl was found dead, a caseworker for a "medically fragile" child called dispatch to complain that Bowden kept canceling visits with child welfare authorities, according to law enforcement.
Officers initially knocked on the front door that day, but received no answer, and, hearing no one stirring inside, they left.
But law enforcement would be back soon.
Hours later, a friend of the family called police to report seeing an unresponsive child through a window in the residence.
That's when police and firefighters finally forced entry into the house and found the teenage girl dead, police said.
"Our hearts break for everyone impacted by the tragic death of this child, and our thoughts are with their family, friends and community," the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement at the time. "NCDHHS supports county departments of social services by conducting case reviews of child fatalities for deaths related to maltreatment from a parent or caretaker."
The defendant is detained in the Guilford County Jail with no bond.
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