The father of Mackenzie Hopkins, the Missouri woman who was found dead in the bathtub of her home, reflects on her life and tragic death.
In an interview with KMBC-TV, Shannon Hopkins recalled seeing Mackenzie’s body in her bathtub at her Kansas City home on January 15, 2022, after she had been beaten to death. Her then four-year-old daughter, Bella, was also beaten and suffered severe head injuries.
Shannon, who arrived at the scene with Mackenzie’s sister Hazel, told the Kansas City outlet that he “went only a few feet into her home,” where “there was a lot of blood.”
“The police pulled me out of the house and came in,” he said, “and she and I collapsed in the yard.”
“I think I thought, ‘They can’t be dead. It’s not possible that this happened this way and it’s not possible that we lost one or both of them,’ he recalled to the outlet.
Elsewhere in the interview, Shannon added, “There’s no way this could have happened this way.”
The dad also said that his daughter “asserted herself as a person when she became a mother.”
“She was caring,” he told KMBC-TV. “She was the person who loved the most.”
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Last Tuesday, more than two years after Mackenzie was fatally beaten, Jose Escalante-Corchado pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and assault, according to court records. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
Shannon told KMBC-TV that while Escalante-Corchado is in prison, “we’re going to learn how to make Mickey’s death mean something.”
“We will have to learn to live with the horrible actions he took that day that changed not only our family’s life, but Bella’s life as well,” he said. “I’m sure it’s affected his family’s day-to-day life, knowing they have this dark history to live with.”
Bella, now 6, now lives with her father in Puerto Rico, according to KMBC-TV.
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Source: HIS Education