INDIANAPOLIS, Indiana (WCMH) — The Marion County Sheriff’s Office in Indiana on Friday filed a new charge against Nalah Jackson — accused of abducting two five-month-old twins in Columbus — stacked onto the other charges she already faces.
Jackson, 24, received a felony battery by bodily waste against a public safety officer charge for spitting on one of the sheriff’s deputies at the detention processing center, according to an affidavit. The incident came as the deputies uncuffed one of her hands after she was arrested on the side of the road in Indianapolis on Thursday afternoon.
The Columbus Division of Police initially announced the new charge coming from Indiana law enforcement via Twitter. Jackson was already facing two charges of kidnapping over the Amber Alert incident back in Ohio.
Investigators began to search for Jackson, and later issued an Amber Alert, after Kyair and Kason Thomas disappeared Monday evening in their mother’s black Honda Accord outside Donatos Pizza on High Street. She was inside — picking up a DoorDash order to deliver — when her children and car were stolen.
Alongside arresting Jackson, officers from the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department also recovered Kason safely. Sergeant Shawn Anderson said in an interview with NBC4’s sister stations WXIN/WTTV on Friday that holding Kason felt familiar to him.
“It felt like the relief of holding one of my own children,” Anderson said. “These are the moments we live for.”
Kyair was found early Tuesday morning, abandoned in a parking lot 70 miles away at the Dayton International Airport. More than two days later and after searches across the state, Jackson was arrested without Kason. It was several hours later when police confirmed they had found the second infant with his mother’s stolen car in a Papa John’s parking lot in Indianapolis.
Before Monday, Jackson was arrested and released routinely
Jackson — who remains in custody Friday morning in Indianapolis and has previously been identified as homeless — had a documented record suggesting she was a flight risk for court.
She was brought to jail and released at least ten times in the last two years, according to Franklin County Municipal Court and Franklin County Court of Common Pleas documents obtained by NBC4, including as recently as three weeks before Kason and Kyair Thomas were taken.
Jackson has a criminal record in Franklin County stretching back to 2018, including child endangerment and interference with custody charges in cases connected to her own children. She also faced various misdemeanor and low-level felony charges.Court records reveal that in 2021, Jackson started to routinely miss scheduled hearings, get arrested, and then get released, sometimes in overlapping cases.
Four of the arrests stemmed from a 2021 felony theft case, in which Jackson was initially indicted in July 2021. In that case, she was released on a recognizance bond in September 2021, so she did not have to pay to be released from custody.
Jackson then failed to show for a hearing in the same case in November 2021, according to records. The court revoked her bond, and she was arrested in February, and then released again on a recognizance bond.
Her bond was revoked, and she was arrested in February, before being released once again on a recognizance bond. This cycle occurred two more times over the course of the theft case, with documents showing Jackson failed to appear for hearings in May and July.
After she was arrested once again on August 22, she pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor theft charge. She was sentenced to 48 days in jail, but released due to time already served.
While that case was being handled in the court of common pleas, Jackson also simultaneously faced receiving stolen property charges in a case being handled in municipal court. Jackson was arrested and released five times, until the case was ultimately dismissed at the prosecutor’s request, according to the docket for that case.
Nearly three months after Jackson’s theft case closed in August, law enforcement records show Grove City police arrested her on a warrant. Jackson was wanted in Gahanna on telecommunications harassment and aggravated menacing charges filed in early November, after a woman shared with police a voicemail recording allegedly of Jackson that threatened her and her family.
Jackson had an outstanding bench warrant issued in a different case by a municipal court judge. She was released on her own recognizance on Nov. 30, less than three weeks Monday, when the Amber Alert went out.
Source: Nexstar Media
