Putting my son in day care when he was just 11 weeks old was one of the hardest choices I had to make. But because the US is the US, I had to go back to work in order for our little family to survive. It was a wildly disorienting experience and required a ton of trust. You have to believe that the staff will do whatever they can to keep your baby safe, and you expect them to care for your little one as well as you would. Although I was lucky and had a largely positive experience with my son’s day care experience, other parents are not as blessed.
A family in Minnesota is in mourning after a day care worker allegedly intentionally suffocated multiple babies, killing one of them, within her first month of working at Rocking Horse Ranch day care, according to Law & Crime.
Theah Russell, 18, is now potentially facing second-degree murder charges in the death of 11-month-old Harvey Muklebust after he was found unresponsive at the Rocking Horse Ranch day care in September 2025. At first Russell tried to claim that Harvey’s parents gave him melatonin to help him sleep because of constipation, intimating that may have had something to do with his death.
However, she later confessed to “intentionally suffocating” Harvey and other children. An investigation was launched after Harvey’s death uncovered that Russell was the last point of contact between two other “medical incidents” that happened at the day care.
KTSP reported that in the first case, Russell claims she heard a baby girl scream while she was napping and went to see what was happening. Russell burped the baby and the child threw up on her, and she noticed a blood-like substance in the vomit. As she was putting the baby back down, she noticed she was turning “white-purple” and was not breathing. After burping the baby again, the infant vomited once more, so Russell called 911.
The second incident details that the same infant had fallen asleep on her stomach, when Russell noticed the baby was crying but nothing was coming out, per KTSP. She said she then burped the baby and a blood-like substance was present in the vomit. The baby was reportedly lethargic and was picked up by her parents.
A blood-like substance was also found pooled in Harvey’s day care crib as well as around his mouth and nose, Law & Crime reported.
“Also learned were past incidents involving starting fires at a church camp and erratic behavior toward other children,” Police Chief Brady Juell explained during a news conference. “During questioning, Theah confessed to intentionally suffocating the two children in an attention-seeking act. She provided detailed descriptions of how she carried out the attempts against the life of the first victim on two separate occasions.”
He also noted that Russell had a dark and documented history of making multiple 911 calls reporting nonsensical incidents before abruptly hanging up.
The boy’s grandmother, Julie Muklebust, also spoke at the news conference, saying his death left a huge hole in the family’s collective heart.
“Harvey’s fingerprints are on my sliding glass door, and his drool stains still show on his crib sheets,” she shared. “Every day we ask ourselves, ‘Why did it have to be you?’ Every day we live with the pain of what happened to you, but we promise that every day we will say your name. Every day we will continue to fight for you and in the end we will make sure that justice has been served.”
Russell has not yet been formally charged but will likely have charges brought against her by the end of the week.
