A four-year-old girl has been found alive in a New York home alongside the bodies of her deceased mother and eight-year-old brother, and is believed to have survived on chocolate.
Lisa Cotton, 38, and her son Nazir Millien, eight, were tragically found deceased at their home on Friday after their landlord raised the alarm.
The woman’s father, 71-year-old Hubert Cotton, had received a call from the landlord of the property asking if Lisa ha moved out.
He told the New York Post: “I had been trying to call her for days and she never answered. I figured she didn’t answer me because she didn’t want me to talk to me.”
Concerned, he sent Lisa’s eldest daughter to the apartment to check on them, where she made the tragic discovery.
She found Nazir, who was disabled after being born prematurely and a feeding tube, slumped in his chair.
Hubert explained: “When she came in, [Nazir] was slumped over.”
The young woman then went looking for Lisa but found four-year-old Promise “feeding herself with chocolate” on her mother’s bed.
“She picked her up and ran out and called the police,” Hubert said, with a transcript of the 911 call stating that she had seen “bugs crawling” on Nazir’s body.
It is not known how long the mom and son had been dead before they were found, but neighbors had reportedly been complaining of a foul odor that smelled like “death” for weeks.
Police had completed a welfare check on Tuesday after receiving an anonymous 911 call, but nobody answered the door at the second-floor unit at East 231st Street.
Despite neighbors telling officers thst they hadn’t seen Lisa or her children in two weeks, responding officers had no reason to break down the door as they dod not hear any noises or notice any smells, police sources told the outlet.
A neighbor added: “[The police] said they’d be back in a few days. One of the social workers said she was trying to get a court order to have the door broken in.”
Neighbors also claimed they’d heard “screaming” coming from the apartment for days.
Neither body reportedly had any signs of trauma, and police told Hubert that they believe Lisa, who had asthma, may have died of cardiac arrest, leaving Nazir to tragically starve to death.
Promise is believed to have kept herself alive by eating chocolate she found inside the home, and was brought to a local hospital in a stable condition.
Hubert is now looking after Promise in his Bronx home and mourned Nazir, who was “so small. I held him in my palm. Like a bird, like a young bird.”
He believes Promise may be traumatized from living with the bodies of her mother and brother for several days, and explained that while she “hasn’t said anything” she often looks at him “like she knows something”.
Hubert, who is originally from St. Kitts, added that his daughter had struggled with her mental health and believed she may have had bipolar disorder.
He also broke down over the prospect of burying both his daughter and grandson, adding: “I’m sorry. . . . Two of them. How am I going to get the money? To bury both of them?”
Eric Perez, who lived above Lisa, added: “The landlord hadn’t done wellness checks, people had called, neighbors called.
“It just smells like rat infested . . . the exterminator said the same thing — the smell is similar to rats and even death.”
Police sources also claimed that the mother had an Administration for Children’s Services case pending against her, after she was arrested in June 2021 on child abandonment charges.
Sources claimed she had been acting erratically, swinging her young daughter around in a stroller and lighting a wig on fire in front of a commercial strip on White Plains Road.
When the police arrived, she was allegedly found walking away from the child, and authorities said the case was later sealed.
An ACS spokesperson told the outlet that the incident is now under investigation.
