Jessica Gasser (Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office)
A 27-year-old mother in Texas was arrested after she allegedly subjected her 3-year-old daughter to multiple unnecessary medical procedures and surgeries, a condition also known as Munchausen syndrome by proxy. Jessica Gasser was taken into custody on Friday following a monthlong investigation into the accusations and charged on suspicion of injury to a child, according to the Tarrant County Criminal Court Clerk’s Office.
Gasser has not yet been formally charged by prosecutors. However, in an affidavit submitted for the issuance of a warrant for Gasser’s arrest earlier this month, investigators claim they have evidence indicating that Gasser should be charged with felony injury to a child — bodily injury.
In a Facebook post, the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office on Tuesday asked for public assistance in gathering evidence against Gasser. Specifically, TCSO requested that anyone who has had “social media contact” with Gasser to contact the sheriff’s office, claiming Gasser has explicitly stated her intention to delete any communications related to the case against her.
“Jessica Gasser is the subject of a medical child abuse case in which she allegedly had multiple unnecessary medical procedures performed on her 3-year-old child,” the sheriff’s office said in the post. “She recently sent messages to a friend stating she would delete all social media posts about her child’s health, including private messages. If you have been in contact with her via social media or text message, please contact Detective Michael Weber at 817-884-3749.”
TCSO noted that Gasser has allegedly been abusing her young daughter for “an unknown amount of time,” and previously used the screen name “MedicalMamaJess” on various social media accounts.
According to the probable cause affidavit obtained by Law&Crime, the investigation into Gasser began in early February, when a liaison to Cook’s Children’s Hospital reached out to authorities about suspected medical child abuse after learning that the victim had been seeing multiple doctors in Texas, Ohio, and Louisiana. Multiple individuals at various facilities allegedly told investigators that it appeared Gasser was “doctor shopping to get what she wanted.”
That month, investigators also learned that Gasser had started a GoFundMe page for her daughter on which she was soliciting donations to pay for a trip to Cleveland, Ohio, to get her daughter treatment for a rare medical condition the victim never had and was never diagnosed with, authorities said.
In March, a doctor at McLane Children’s Medical Center filed a report of suspicions of medical child abuse after Gasser was allegedly caught “venting” her daughter’s feeding bag, which “caused the formula not to go into the victim’s feeding tube.” Gasser was allegedly caught doing this on several occasions after her child did not display the symptoms from which she reported the victim had been suffering.
Authorities in May obtained a search warrant for some of Gasser’s social media accounts and detailed some of the allegedly incriminating conversations she had while direct messaging other users.
For example, after being reported to Child Protective Services by numerous medical providers, Gasser in October 2022 wrote to another user: “Deleted all TikTok posts and I’m gonna take down Instagram and I deleted all posts and working on FB messages. They can search messages with a warrant.”
Investigators noted that the lack of messages about her daughter’s health indicated that “the suspect did delete at least a portion of her Facebook account” prior to the warrant being issued.
Investigators also noted that Gasser allegedly performed internet searches in June for “Tarrant county medical child abuse cases,” “how to fix munchausen by proxy,” and “Is lying to a doctor about a child illegal,” according to the affidavit.
The affidavit further stated that in the few weeks the victim was being cared for by someone other than her mother, the child began “thriving” physically.
Gasser remained in Tarrant County Jail as of Tuesday afternoon, records show.
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