Linn County in Iowa
Rylee Marie Gray
2 YOA
1614 Park Towne Ln. NE
Cedar Rapids, IA
Linn County
Date of Crime: December 23, 1994
Date of Death: December 25, 1994
Two-year-old Rylee M. Gray was taken to St. Lukes Hospital in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on Dec. 23, 1994, suffering from injuries to her head, buttocks, and extremities.
Doctors discovered the toddler had a subdural hematoma and brain swelling, and despite rushing her into emergency surgery, the child died Christmas Day.
Investigators arrested Matthew Lewis, the boyfriend of the child’s mother, Elise Gray, and charged him with Rylee’s murder; the young girl had previously been injured while in his care.
At Lewis’s trial, however, it was revealed that on the night before the child died, he had had an argument with Elise Gray and that Gray had left their apartment in anger, slamming the little girl into her carseat hitting her in the head with a diaper bag.
The child’s injuries, the defense attorney argued, could have been inflicted at that point on the child, who then slowly sank into unconsciousness over the next 24 hours.
It also was revealed that Gray was a less than stellar mother to the little girl, often moving in with men she’d just met and then moving out just as quickly. In addition, the defense alleged Gray took drugs and drank alcohol in the child’s presence.
The jury acquitted Matthew Lewis of murder charges and no one else was ever charged with Rylee’s death.
According to one source, the only person who really seemed to mourn the child’s passing was her grandfather, Don Gray, of Central City.
Rylee was born July 29, 1992.
If you have any information about Rylee’s death, please contact the Cedar Rapids Police Department at 319-286-5378 or direct your message to Iowa Cold Cases via our Contact form.
What did Social Services do about this information? It would be easy for a judge to have a protection order in place for this child and an explanation to the mother that if ANYTHING unhealthy happens to her child she will go to prison for non-protection.
ref: the young girl had previously been injured while in his care. It also was revealed that Gray was a less than stellar mother to the little girl. If there was a case worker, they should pay the price.
I’ve seen alcoholics sober up, drug addicts get help and then stay home, clean house, play with their children, get a job, wash clothes, bath their children, get rid of diaper rash, display love and affection that the child responds back to, and buy nutritious food with words like that. All that is needed is regular check-ups (at least once a month, that is a child must be visually seen and checked over once a month).
I was the one who submitted the information for this case and while I admit my memory is a bit hazy due to the nearly 2 decades since this murder, I don’t believe any kind of neglect or abuse report was ever made to DHS concerning Rylee Gray. Without that initial report, no caseworker would be assigned to track her case, therefore no restraining order or other means could’ve been put into place to protect her.
Plus, there’s no guarantee that even if any kind of report had been filed with DHS, that anything would’ve been done with it. This case occurred prior to the 2000 brutal murder of little Shelby Duis and the reporting process and follow-up process of DHS at that time was often extremely lax. Even after Shelby’s death brought about a massive overhaul of the system, cases can still fall through the cracks because social services are seriously overworked, understaffed, and underfunded. I can cite any number of child deaths in recent years, even recent months, where a report concerning potential abuse, molestation, or neglect of the child was on file, yet nothing was done to remove the child or otherwise ensure their safety and the child was murdered, usually at the hands of their abuser or molester. So unfortunately, even having a report on file or having the child in the system doesn’t guarantee they will automatically be protected.
As to the injuries allegedly inflicted by Mr. Lewis prior to Rylee’s death, I believe they were incurred in the days before she died and not any longer than that. Ms. Gray did not live with Mr. Lewis for very long, so there wasn’t a huge span of time that Rylee could’ve been injured by him.
Excellent Points Kim. The laws covering children like that back then were much laxer. For example the Eli Creekmore case in Washington State. His Grand-Mother begged Social Services several times a month to remove him from the home for his safety, but he wasn’t. I was just thinking that this child was abused by everybody except the Grandfather. No one seemed to care.