Father still seeking answers after Maryland mom was rearrested for 2014 murder of 2 children

CBS News

4 days ago

The father of two Maryland children who have been missing since 2014 says he remains focused on getting closure after the mother has been arrested again and charged with killing her two children.
"I want to say this loud and clear, the main thing for me is my kids," Troy Turner, the children's father, said Tuesday at Catherine Hoggle's bond hearing. "If there's justice that can be involved, then you want justice. But No. 1 is finding my children, giving them a proper place to rest."
Hoggle, 38, who has a long history of mental illness, was denied bail on Tuesday after she was rearrested last week.
Turner's children — Sarah and Jacob Hoggle — were ages 3 and 2 when they were last seen in Montgomery County in September 2014. The father reported to police that the children and Catherine Hoggle were missing. The children's bodies were never found, but they are presumed to be dead.
Hoggle was found days later by police while wandering in nearby Montgomery County. She told police the children were safe and being cared for, but would not say where.
"I don't know if much changes after 11 years," Turner said Tuesday. "It's amazing how much you can get used to. It feels like we are in a little bit of a better place to kind of keep things moving forward, one way or the other."
Catherine Hoggle was initially arrested for neglect and abduction, which are misdemeanors, CBS News Baltimore previously reported.
In 2017, she was indicted on murder charges. However, she was found incompetent to stand trial and was given a continuing court-ordered treatment. Maryland law says she had five years to restore competency before the charges must be dismissed.
Hoggle was once again found not mentally fit to stand trial in 2022, and the murder charges were dropped.
She has spent years at Clifton T. Perkins Hospital, a state-run psychiatric hospital in Jessup, Maryland, before she was released in July. It is unclear why Hoggle was released from the hospital.
Hoggle was rearrested Friday after a grand jury reindicted her on two counts of first-degree murder.
"I think our best chance is to keep her medicated, to continue to allow her to move forward in that way, in the hope that gets us through court," Turner said at Tuesday's hearing. "I've said this before, I think we have a much better chance from a jail cell than Perkins, of her saying something."
The next goal for the Montgomery County State's Attorney is to convince the court that Hoggle is now competent to stand trial for the murder of her children.
Since her charges were dropped in 2022, Hoggle was ordered to remain involuntarily committed because she was still considered to be a danger to herself and others.
"She seems substantially improved from where she was years ago," Montgomery County State's Attorney John McCarthy said. "That gives me greater hope that we will be successful in meeting our legal challenge, in terms of incompetence."
Hoggle's attorney, David Felsen, has said she has a history of schizophrenia and was treated with antipsychotic medications after her arrest.
State's Attorney McCarthy says he is going to argue that her mental capacity has improved, based on her release from the hospital.
"Everybody who has experienced mental illness, where somebody is today, can change tomorrow based on psychotherapy, based on medications, it can change," McCarthy said. "That's what we are going to look at, where is she at today? As we said in open court, she was committed because she was a danger to herself or others two and a half years ago. She has apparently improved because she is no longer a danger to herself or others; she is free, living in the community."