Dad allegedly threw daughter into alligator-infested river because he didn’t want her

A man is facing first-degree murder charges after allegedly throwing his two-day-old daughter into alligator-infested waters because he didn’t want her.

Brandon Isabelle, 28, was seen in a Texas courtroom, facing trial for the 2022 killings of his newborn daughter, Kennedy, and the child’s mother, Danielle Hoyle, 27. At the time of the killings, Isabelle was dating Hoyle despite being married to another woman. Her mother, April Campbell, told the court how she warned her daughter against getting involved with a married man.

“If he’s married, how do you think he’s gonna treat you?” Campbell recalled telling her daughter. However, Hoyle told her mother that Isabelle was “working toward being separated.”

Campbell said she didn’t approve of the relationship, but was happy that her daughter seemed happy. At the same time, Isabelle was dating yet another woman, Artesha Stewart. Stewart testified on Thursday, giving details of her relationship with Isabelle and the love triangle with Hoyle. She told the court that she began dating Isabelle in 2021 and had been in an on-and-off relationship into early 2022, when Hoyle was murdered.

When the two started dating, Stewart believed Isabelle was single. However, she later learned that he was married with a five-year-old child, but was separated from his wife. But she soon learned about Hoyle, leading to a tense relationship between the two women, which included making snarky comments about one another and leaving nasty messages. Isabelle soon admitted that Hoyle was pregnant and that there was a chance of him being the father.

As Hoyle was in the hospital in labor, Stewart and Isabelle kept in contact. After baby Kennedy was born, Stewart bought a paternity test after discussing it with Isabelle. Hoyle wanted Isabelle to sign the baby’s birth certificate, but Stewart admitted that she didn’t want him to. Hoyle, already a mother to a nine-year-old daughter, was overjoyed to have another baby, said her mother. Before the baby’s birth, Hoyle and Campbell went on a shopping spree to get supplies.

The new mom-of-two introduced Kenney to Campbell at the family home, and the grandmother spent just over an hour with the baby, taking photos. But Hoyle left, saying that she wasn’t supposed to be released from the hospital and needed to take the baby back. However, Campbell later learned that her daughter was meeting up with Isabelle, who allegedly lured Hoyle to meet him in Memphis, Tennessee, with their daughter. Isabelle allegedly shot Hoyle in the head and threw Kennedy into the Mississippi River, said prosecutors.

The baby’s body was never found, but alligators are known to frequent the river and have been spotted in Memphis in recent years. At the time of her death, Kennedy weighed only six pounds and was 17 inches long. Isabelle later told detectives that he killed Hoyle and threw his daughter into the river because he did not want the child, according to an affidavit.

He told police that he took Kennedy, drove to Mud Island on the Mississippi River, and tossed her into the water at a boat ramp. Isabelle then threw the gun he used to allegedly kill Hoyle into the river at a different location.

Isabelle was arrested in 2022 after police found an abandoned car and Hoyle’s body nearby. The mother had been shot multiple times in the head.Hoyle’s family told police that she had her baby with her, but officers didn’t find the child in the car. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation issued an Amber Alert for the baby. Her car seat was found hours later in a Walmart parking lot, but there was still no sign of Kennedy.

Despite what he told police, Isabelle has pleaded not guilty to the murders and his other charges of aggravated kidnapping, aggravated child abuse, and neglect and tampering or fabricating evidence.