Mobile woman admits to killing child with broomstick

By Brendan Kirby

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    MOBILE, Alabama (WALA) — On the eve of trial, a woman charged with felony murder accepted a plea bargain Monday.

Yolanda Denise Coale, 55, pleaded guilty to reckless manslaughter. A judge set sentencing for February and allowed her to remain free on bail until then.

Mobile police found 4-year-old King Lyons dead in his home on Jacob Drive in February last year.

Police initially charged Coale, who was Lyons’s guardian, with child abuse. A grand jury later upgraded the charge to felony murder, alleging she was caused his death by beating him with a broomstick. Authorities at the time charged the boy’s 9-year-old sister with assault, alleging that she had hit the boy with a broom handle. According to the Mobile County District Attorney’s Office, those charges were dismissed.

A police detective testified at Coale’s preliminary hearing last year that Lyons was stripped naked and hit with what one child described as a diamond-studded belt. The detective said there were other forms of punishment, including putting the child in a “lock-up room.”

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