The Case Files: Julissa Thaler
The boy failed by the system, and the father who tried to save him from the sadistic mother hell-bent on keeping her son at all costs - even if it meant murder.
Content warning: This is another rough read, so once again please read with discretion.
The boy failed by the system, and the father who tried to save him from the sadistic mother hell-bent on keeping her son at all costs - even if it meant murder.
May 20, 2022 was a seasonally warm spring day in Mound, Minnesota, about 22 miles west of Minneapolis. Officers from the Orono Police Department (OPD) responded to a citizen’s call about a Chevy Impala being driven without a front tire, riding straight on the rim, and a shattered back window. When they pulled the car over at Shoreline Drive and Bartlett Boulevard, they had no idea that in mere minutes, the rim and window would be the least of their worries.
According to the affidavit, officers approached the vehicle and spoke with the driver: Julissa Thaler, a 28-year-old woman with her long hair dyed white with the natural dark undertones and roots, parted to one side, and on the other, locks of hair braided along her scalp. The longer ends at the back had been tied into a messy pony tail. Her dark brown, piercing eyes withheld the secrets of what she had done the night before, that of which the cops were about to discover. And she must have known it was over. She had to have known.
While questioning her, they noted something eerie and disturbing — there appeared to be blood on the woman’s hand. A further observation found a shotgun shell and a spent casing in the vehicle. When their preliminary examination of the car shifted to the back, they saw what appeared to be a bullet hole in the back seat.
Police determined there was probable cause to fully search the vehicle before it was towed. They released Thaler from the scene and allowed her to go home. It didn’t take long for officers to realize this had been a mistake.
When they opened the trunk, they found a body of a young boy who had been shot multiple times, wrapped up in a gray blanket. With his frail remains in the trunk was a shotgun.
Police immediately went to Thaler’s apartment to retrieve her. By the time they got to her door, she was gone. A routine traffic stop had become a homicide investigation, and the woman who drove the car containing a child’s body had fled.
The washing machine was still running. Police pulled out the clothes Thaler had worn at the scene. They caught up to her taking off on foot, and promptly arrested her. While putting the handcuffs on, cops observed what appeared to be blood and brain matter in her hair.
Witnesses came forward about Thaler’s activity while she had been driving, the affidavit explains. Someone spotted the Impala at a gas station shortly before Thaler was pulled over. The witness stated that the car had stopped near the dumpsters.
When cops searched those dumpsters, they found a backpack, bone, and more blood and brain matter.
The damage done to the road by the car’s tireless rim allowed police to follow the marks left behind. Along the way, they discovered pieces of a young boy’s life thrown out like trash. Blood and brain matter had been scattered along the road. In one dumpster, they found a bloodied child booster seat that had damage consistent with a shotgun blast. Another search of the vehicle revealed massive amounts of blood and still more brain matter in the backseat.
Shortly after the traffic stop, police also discovered from a friend of Thaler’s that she said she wanted to learn how to use a gun. The friend, identified as R.P. in the affidavit, took her to the gun range. They also said that when she took the shotgun in and out of the apartment, she’d wrap it in a gray blanket. This conversation revealed that Thaler bought the shotgun on March 17, 2022, and over the next two days, she had gone to the gun range with her friend.
This child’s death had been violent, sadistic, and horrifying. Investigators determined this young boy had been strapped in his booster seat, facing his mother, when he was shot up to nine times in the torso and head before being put in the trunk. The car got towed. Police had Thaler in custody. But who was the child who faced such a mortifying death?
The boy who wanted to be a firefighter
Family members later identified the child as six-year-old Eli Hart — Julissa Thaler’s own son. Investigators soon learned of a bitter custody dispute between Thaler and Eli’s father, Tory Hart, that had spanned almost two years. And little Eli was stuck in the middle.
Thaler was held for probable cause murder in the Hennepin County Jail on a $2 million bond while the rest of the family grieved, and as news of the cold-hearted murder spread throughout the community.
Tory’s fiancée, Josie Josephson, first spoke to 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS on May 21 regarding the identification and the family’s devastation.
“I guess we’re just doing the best we can,” she said. “Tory and I are grieving in our separate ways. He’s still trying to absorb this. To him, it’s really hard to believe that this is real, that he’ll never see Eli again.”
“Eli was the sweetest kid. Very kind. Anyone who knew Eli just fell in love with him,” Josephine continued. “He was always happy, full of energy, full of questions, very inquisitive. He loved to play with matchbox cars. Recently, he learned how to fish.”
Josephine also opened up about the custody battle, explaining that she and Tory just wanted to remain a part of Eli’s life, and Thaler was doing anything to prevent that from happening.
“He was placed in the custody of Dakota County. He was in Dakota County’s custody for 457 days,” she explained. “During that time, we worked closely with Dakota County. They allowed us to be involved in Eli’s life. He was allowed visits with us, unsupervised visits.”
Nikita Kronberg, whose husband is Thaler’s cousin, set up the GoFundMe page for the family to raise money for Eli’s funeral. She wrote of how Thaler filed several false Orders of Protection against Tory, preventing him from seeing his son.
Despite Thaler’s attempts at isolating her son, Eli was placed into foster care in January 2021 with Kronberg and her husband. Court records obtained by KARE11 revealed that Thaler was hospitalized at that time, hearing voices which told her to kill herself, accompanied with paranoid delusions.
The foster placement began a loving, healthy chapter in the young boy’s life. During that time, Eli lived with Kronberg, her husband, and her two sons. It may have been the only time in his life he knew how it felt to be in a stable family setting.
“Eli spent 11 months living in my home at that time. During that time, Eli and Tory were able to start a relationship, and their bond was powerful from the start,” Kronberg wrote. “Eli fell in love with his father and loved spending time with him. Tory was excited to make up for all the lost years and was thrilled to start teaching his son how to fish and ride a bike with no training wheels.”
She added that as 2021 ended, Eli was returned to his mother for a home trial. Josephine told EYEWITNESS that Thaler was living in a Spring Park apartment complex. She and Tory continued to visit Eli every other weekend and every Tuesday.
“We live about an hour-and-a-half from where Eli is located, and every Tuesday we drove two-and-a-half hours to see him, and two-and-a-half hours to go home, and that was for a two hour visit. We never missed a visit,” Josephine stated.
During this time, Kronberg said that Thaler continued to file false Orders of Protection against Tory while he battled to get custody of Eli.
“Numerous parties made many statements to CPS, fearing that mom would harm Eli if full custody were returned. Sadly full custody was returned on May 10, 2022,” Kronberg said. The custody case was closed.
How did the system fail Eli so badly?
Tory had filed once more for custody of Eli six days before the murder. In this filing, Tory gave the judge a detailed history of Thaler’s mental health. Several family members expressed concern and raised numerous red flags that she might harm Eli, KARE11 reported.
By August 2022, Tory filed a lawsuit against Dakota County staff for failing to prevent his son’s murder. He sought more than $75,000 in damages and named specific employees who had a part in returning Eli to his mother.
In February 2021, the lawsuit alleges that a social worker watched via shared video as Thaler showed cat feces to the boy. Later, the video showed Thaler attempting to cook while grabbing the cat by the neck and muttering to herself.
Tory reported that in February 2022, Eli often arrived at school without his hearing aids. He also told his teacher on several occasions that he hadn’t been getting much sleep. When Tory had a FaceTime call with his son on December 27, 2021, Eli was in the same PJs he’d worn on December 23. He told his dad that Santa hadn’t visited Thaler’s apartment that year.
In a baffling turn, even the very social workers who returned Eli to his mother had raised red flags about Thaler, according to the KARE11 report. They revealed that Thaler had a history of severe mental illness, yet stopped going to her therapist. She constantly violated her leases and moved often, creating an unstable housing situation.
Thaler was also instructed to complete a parenting education program, but failed to do so as she missed too many classes. Social workers also said she failed to sign releases to give workers access to Eli’s medical records.
The workers noted that Tory appeared “to be a stabilizing force in Eli’s life” and expressed concern over Thaler’s blatant attempts to sabotage the relationship between the father and son. None of the accusations Thaler made in filing the Orders of Protection could be verified by social workers. She claimed he used drugs and had been abusive, but couldn’t produce proof of any hospitalizations she said to have experienced because of the alleged abuse.
A previous police report obtained by social workers revealed that Thaler admitted her accusations against Tory “were not true and likely due to her own mental health diagnosis.”
As a result of his ex’s accusations, Tory had to undergo random drug tests. They all came back negative.
In wanting the custody case to proceed to court, social workers recommended the file be closed. A judge did just that. Under state law in Minnesota, the protection case has to be closed in order for the custody case to proceed to court. Tory’s filing for custody was rendered inactive as long as the protective case remained open.
When Tory voiced his concerns over Thaler cutting him off once Eli was back in her custody, he was told to talk to someone else.
“Mr. Hart has been advised to handle this situation within the family court setting,” Eli’s social worker, Beth Dehner, wrote in her final report before the case was closed.
In closing the file, it meant no social workers would be watching over Thaler and her son. She was left unsupervised, severely mentally ill, dependent on drugs, and unstable, with Eli.
Kronberg supported Tory in the concerns over Eli returning to Thaler.
“I feared if she got custody back, that she would harm Eli, if not worse,” she said. “I instantly responded with, you know, this is a dangerous situation for Eli. You know, I fear for his safety if he's returned to her. There's numerous things I had brought up that were concerning that I had noticed.”
George Thaler, Julissa’s own father, even voiced concerns over Eli’s safety with his daughter at a November 2021 court hearing regarding the custody dispute.
“I'm very, very, very, very concerned for Eli. I’m terrified about Julissa. She’s got many arrests for assault and dangerous behavior, put Eli in very dangerous [situations.] I’m just saying there’s a very, very long history. He’s got high needs, a very good kid. I don’t think she’s capable of giving him what he needs by any stretch, and that’s it,” he told a judge.
Tory refused to stand down. In his lawsuit, he stated that while Thaler may have pulled the trigger, ultimately the lack of action from Dakota County provided the “proximate cause” of Eli’s death.
“My son is not safe with her. How much damage is she allowed to inflict in his life?” Tory said at a 2021 custody hearing. “How is this even allowed to happen? Who is protecting Eli?”
The Trial
At the same time as Tory filed the lawsuit against Dakota County social workers, Thaler remained incarcerated, awaiting mental health evaluations. She was ultimately charged with second-degree murder.
However, in early September 2022, Thaler refused to partake in any mental competency evaluations that would have allowed criminal proceedings to continue.
A mental competency evaluation doesn’t mean a defendant is trying for an insanity plea. It simply means that a psychologist has to determine whether a defendant understands court proceedings and can rationally consult with their defense team in order to participate in the trial.
Judge Lisa Janzen confirmed during a September hearing that Thaler refused to cooperate with any evaluation, KARE11 reported. Ruling Thaler incompetent to stand trial could have delayed the trial by at least six months so she could undergo treatment. Her next court date was scheduled for September 27, 2022.
At that hearing, Judge Lanzen ruled Thaler competent to stand trial. Thaler didn’t address the court at that time, but her defense attorney, Bryan Leary, spoke on the matter.
“As this case moves forward, Ms. Thaler is hopeful that she’ll be released from jail to prepare her defense and grieve her loss,” he stated. “In jail, in a cage, her grief has no place to go.”
In early October, Thaler was offered a plea deal by the prosecution: a 40-year sentence in exchange for her guilty plea to the second-degree murder of her son. The offer only stood valid until the end of the month, though, after which it would be pulled off the table.
Her defense filed a motion to have her released on no bail on the condition she would abide by electronic home monitoring, claiming she was “a person of good character and sound judgment” who lacked a criminal history. They sought to have the case thrown out completely, and to have as much evidence suppressed during the trial as possible.
The judge rejected this motion.
“The defense is disappointed in the Court’s ruling –while the Court believed Ms. Thaler poses a flight risk and a risk to public safety, she had no convictions or history of not appearing for court. A trial date is now set, and we shall be prepared to defend this case,” Leary said.
If Thaler refused the deal, prosecutors would have been able to indict her on first-degree murder charges, which carries a life sentence. Her trial was scheduled to start on January 30, 2023.
Thaler rolled the dice and rejected the deal. January came around and she stood trial for a new indictment: first-degree murder.
Jury Selection
Before opening statements, Assistant Hennepin County Attorney Dan Allard reassured both the judge and potential jurors that graphic crime scene photos of Eli Hart’s dead body wouldn’t be shown in court, as even he didn’t want to see them again.
“They are horrid,” he stated. He did add, though, that the photos that would be shown were bad enough.
Jury selection took place during the first week of February. Prosecutors maintained that the bitter custody dispute drove Thaler to murder her son, but Thaler proclaimed during a January 30 hearing that she would have never done such a thing.
However, prosecutors revealed Thaler’s Google search history, which included subjects like “How much blood can a child lose.” They also alleged that she looked up life insurance policies for her son.
Since it was a first-degree murder trial, each juror was individually questioned by both the prosecution and defense before Hennepin County District Judge Jay Quam.
Amidst her claims she didn’t kill Eli, Thaler asked that she be permitted to leave the room when the photos of her son were shown.
Assistant Hennepin County Attorney Dan Allard said Thaler needs to be present at such a vital time in the trial, adding the photos were “as bad as I've seen in any case.”
The judge denied Thaler’s request. The Star Tribune, present in the court room, reported that Thaler shook her head and sat with her arms crossed when Judge Quam announced the denial of her request, stating he had no authority to excuse Thaler.
Thaler once more refused to take the plea deal offered to her.
Opening Statements
The trial got underway on Friday, Feb. 3, 2023, during which the defense and prosecution laid their cases before the judge and jury - and the heartbroken father spoke out for the first time since Eli’s violent death.
The prosecution opened with describing Eli when he was alive, “a friendly talkative outgoing kindergartener. He loved playing with cars and going fishing with his dad.” Assistant Hennepin County Attorney Britta Rapp promised the court she would show evidence proving Thaler maliciously ended the life of her own innocent son.
The evidence, Rapp said, included surveillance video from the night before Eli died, showing Thaler leaving the apartment with Eli and a large object wrapped in a blanket, which she put into the trunk of her car. In that blanket, Rapp said, was the shotgun with which Thaler had killed Eli. Wrapped around it was the same gray blanket police found in the trunk the next day, enveloping Eli’s lifeless body.
Rapp also revealed that the prosecution could prove Thaler shopped for that shotgun for a month, and allegedly told the salesperson who sold her the ammo that she wanted one that would “blow the biggest hole in something.”
In the days before Eli’s death, Rapp said a gun shop witness saw Thaler buy 40 rounds of ammunition for the shotgun.
Included in the evidence would be Thaler’s Google searches. The prosecution pointed out that looking up how much blood a child can lose, and researching life insurance policies for her son, only proved that Eli’s murder was premeditated. Therefore, Rapp asserted, Thaler should be convicted of first-degree murder.
Defense attorney Rebecca Noothe simply told the court that “Julissa Thaler is not guilty of murdering her son,” and promised to show that intent and guilt cannot be proved by the evidence to be presented, though Noothe gave no alternative explanation as to how Eli wound up dead.
Noothe did, however, say that there is evidence Thaler was planning a life with her son that included Disney trips, and that Thaler bought the shotgun for their protection.
“There are no witnesses who heard her talk about killing, no witnesses who saw her pull the trigger – because she didn’t. Evidence won’t show premeditation or intent,” Noothe added.
The testimony of a heartbroken father
Letting his voice be heard for the first time since the murder, Tory Hart took the stand, speaking in a quiet voice. He told the jury how he filed for full custody of Eli in March 2022. Thaler vehemently opposed, wanting to keep Eli for herself.
Tory described his son as popular with other kids at Shirley Hills Primary School in Mound, where he was loved by everyone.
“He just really liked being social, talking and playing with others,” Tory said, adding after: “He was always really happy, outgoing, always full of energy, always.”
He went to explain that Eli was born with a genetic disorder which required a few surgeries within his first few months of life.
A KARE11 report revealed that Eli was diagnosed with Townes-Brocks syndrome. The rare genetic disorder can cause abnormalities within the body’s organs. Eli wore hearing aids and had a few minimal deformities.
But, Tory told the court, Eli was otherwise a normal kid. He listed Eli’s favorite things as blowing bubbles, going fishing, swinging on swing sets at the park, and eating meatballs.
“He was everything to me. He completed my life. He just loved spending time with me and I loved spending time with him,” Tory said.
The ex-boyfriend who almost saw it happen
The night of May 19, 2022 is one that will likely haunt Thaler’s former boyfriend, Robert Pikkarainen, for the rest of his life. During his testimony on February 7, 2023, he explained that he and Thaler reconnected in 2022 after knowing each other in high school. They would get together to use drugs.
Pikkarainen described the fateful night before the murder. He had joined Thaler when she went to pick up Eli from school, then they spent the evening at Thaler’s apartment. He became emotional as he relived how they had pizza, played with kittens, and were going to play Xbox games.
“We started playing with the kitties and Eli was getting rowdy and Mom didn’t like it. She was hitting him. Then Eli was hitting her – they were fighting. So she put the shotgun in the car and she came back up. I was lying in her bed. She grabbed Eli and went downstairs,” Pikkarainen said.
He told the court he fell asleep and awoke at 8 or 8:30 the next morning. When he asked Thaler where she had gone the night before, she “was kind of like, ‘I had to go do something.’” Pikkarainen added he assumed Eli was already at school.
Thaler made mention of the police, but when he asked her what she was talking about, she didn’t elaborate, he continued. They stopped at a lake after they left the apartment, but she still wouldn’t say why cops were there. Both he and Thaler were taken into custody, though he had no idea why, he claimed.
Pikkarainen was eventually released without charges.
He was, however, the individual identified as R.P. in the affidavit who was with Thaler when she purchased the shotgun on March 17. The trial revealed that he was also the one she went to the gun range with to learn how to use it.
“She told you she wanted the gun for protection, right?” Noothed asked.
“Yes, she did,” Pikkarainen replied.
“She mentioned that multiple times?” Noothed said.
“Yes,” Pikkarainen said.
“She said she wanted protection from her ex?” Noother asked.
Allard objected to this question. Judge Quam sustained the objection and told jurors to ignore the question referencing Tory. Noothed approached another line of questioning at this stonewall.
“You told police you didn’t think she could hurt Eli?” she asked.
“I didn’t think so, no. She was a sweet person,” Pikkarainen said.
Thaler didn’t take the stand in her own defense, nor did the defense call any witnesses for their side.
The crime scene and trail of evidence didn’t lack DNA evidence which could potentially be used against Thaler. Sure enough, a DNA expert testified that the blood found in Thaler’s hair during the May 20 traffic stop matched Eli’s blood.
Defense lawyer Bryan Leary argued that even with the seemingly abundance of evidence, it didn’t place the gun in Thaler’s hands.
“She’s not charged with the crime they have proved. She destroyed evidence, lied to police, ran away, but they have not proved beyond a reasonable doubt that the gun was in her hands when it was fired nine times into her son,” Leary said.
Allard argued that cellphone data linked Thaler to all the sites involved with the murder, proved that Thaler killed Eli for life insurance money, due to her deteriorating mental health, or from the stress of the custody battle with Tory.
He added that Eli’s DNA was found on Thaler and her clothes, questioning why, if she didn’t shoot Eli, hadn’t she notified police that someone had done so, considering the child’s body was in her trunk.
The Verdict
Jury deliberations began on February 8, 2023, and it only took them a mere two hours to reach a verdict: Julissa Angelica Genrich Thaler was convicted of first-degree and second-degree murder for the horrifying shooting death of her own son, Eli Hart.
In a statement, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said this case “is one of the most horrific cases I have encountered in 30 years working in the criminal legal system.”
“Nothing will ever fill the emptiness Eli’s father and other loved ones now live with every day,” she added. “But I’m hopeful this verdict will make it just a bit easier to remember Eli as the toothless, happy, smiling little boy we have seen in photos.”
On February 16, Thaler sat through victim impact statements read out by Eli’s stepmother and his aunt before Judge Jay Quam handed down the sentence.
Josephine remained at Tory’s side during the hearing as she read out a statement.
“You could see the love and bonding shared every second they were together. Nothing will ever be the same. The pain will never go away,” she said. Tory opted not to speak to the court.
Nikita Kronberg told the room how Eli became more of a son to her than a nephew in the time she fostered him, and how he was like a brother to her own two sons.
“Eli meant the world to so many people. He was so kind and so amazing. Always had a smile on his face,” Kronberg said.
She went on to tell the court about how her son’s devastation over losing Eli made him not want to go to school anymore since his cousin would no longer be there. Kronberg expressed feelings of guilt over being unable to save Eli from his own mother.
“To this day, I blame myself for not saving Eli when I was fostering him. I should have documented things better, taken pictures or video of Eli and any encounters I had with this monster (Thaler),” she said. “How could someone do such an evil thing to an amazing, loving kid?”
After concluding her statement, Judge Quam spoke to Kronberg.
“You realize it wasn’t your fault... it wasn’t your fault at all,” he said. “So the sooner you let go of that, the sooner you can appreciate all the time you did have with Eli. Thank you for what you did.. for Eli… you made his life better.”
After victim impact statements, Thaler had her own choice few words for the court room in an outbreak of indignation.
“I’m innocent, fu** you all, you’re garbage,” she said.
Judge Quam retorted to her enraged outburst with a lecture.
“Ms. Thaler, I don’t know that that's appropriate here. The worst thing that seems to happen to parents is to lose their child. It’s worse though, when you don’t lose your child to something like cancer or an accident. It’s when someone takes that child from the world. What I can’t imagine, nobody can imagine, is when the person who takes a child from the world is the one that brought that child in,” he said.
Upon concluding his speech, Judge Quam sentenced Thaler to the mandatory life sentence without parole which accompanies a first-degree murder conviction by default in Minnesota.
For a woman so desperate to maintain control over life, to maintain custody over her child to continue hurting his father, she will live out her days in a cell as empty as her life.
Josephine used her chance to speak with KARE 11 after the hearing to direct attention to the memorial playground the family hopes to build at Surfside Beach in Eli’s name.
A statement from the family thanked those involved with Thaler’s conviction:
“On behalf of Eli’s family, Tory Hart would like to thank the jury, the court, the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office and justice partners for their good work,” it read. “This is a tragic and heartbreaking event that could have been avoided if Eli had never been returned to a dangerous home.”
The Psychology: How a mother could become a monster
Forensic psychiatrist Dr. Phillip J. Resnick outlined five different classifications for why women commit filicide, the murder of their own children. The innocent little ones who lose their lives at the hands of an enraged mother amidst a bitter custody dispute much like one Julissa embroiled both Tory and Eli in falls under what Resnick calls the “Spousal Revenge” classification.
Cruel, intentional, degrading, and scathing is the type of women often behind these murders. Mental illness may play a part, but typically, these mothers know what they are doing and cannot claim psychosis or severe mental problems for a legal defense. Sadly, Eli, who only wanted to spend time with the dad who loved him and fought for him so valiantly, got caught in the middle of a battle his mother used to sabotage that relationship.
The Star Tribune got their hands on medical records which revealed that Thaler was in and out of mental hospitals between the ages of 13 and 18 and was diagnosed with a mood disorder, depression, and borderline personality disorder (BPD).
Now, as the usual disclaimer, not everyone with BPD is violent or homicidal. These are extreme cases that do not reflect everyone who is diagnosed with this disorder. This is not meant to generalize those, especially mothers, who live with BPD. Not everyone with BPD harms their kids. We don’t glue stigmas to people here. Many other factors led up to Thaler’s actions, too.
What BPD likely contributed to this situation was the intense fear of abandonment which would have only enhanced the psychological factors discussed below. Impulsive and risky behaviors are also associated with BPD, such as substance abuse or sabotaging relationships. Wide mood swings and a difficulty with emotional regulation are also symptoms.
While these definitely played a part in Thaler’s actions, there are other factors. There comes a point where as adults, we must become accountable for our actions and cannot blame everything on a mental illness or on others. Thaler deflected her own bad decisions onto others and didn’t take responsibility for her own failings as a mother. She refused treatment and therapy, even when it meant she might lose custody of her son. Instead, she chose toxic behaviors and, finally, violence.
KARE11’s investigative report, which included an intensive review of court records about Eli’s case, revealed that Thaler started drinking and using cannabis at age 13. At 16, she was taking opiates, and by 20 she was also doing sedatives.
At 21, Thaler used LSD daily, according to the report. December 2015 was the first time child services was notified of Thaler’s activity. She was suspected of exposing Eli to drugs while still pregnant with him.
When Eli was a year and a half old, child services once more received a report regarding Thaler. This time, she was allegedly delusional and despondent, convinced a bug was trying to attack her son.
Sometimes, the only way Eli could get his mother’s attention was by banging his head on the table.
Thaler agreed to get treatment for them both, and that file was closed.
In 2019, amidst her unverified allegations of abuse against Tory, she claimed he planted a bomb on her car. Police found a water bottle full of nails instead of a bomb, but this still laid the foundation for which Thaler used to filed a false Order of Protection against Tory. He wasn’t allowed to contact her, which effectively isolated his son from him.
Her mental problems continued with breakdowns in 2020 and 2021, during which times she would leave Eli naked among broken eggs, garbage, and even a flooded bathroom. The records state that raw eggs were smeared across the floor, with other food in “various states of decay” around the home. A fence was left disassembled on the kitchen floor, which workers deemed a safety hazard to Eli. The worker couldn’t find any clothes other than a set of PJs for Eli anywhere in the home.
Three months later, when Thaler heard the voices telling her to commit suicide, workers found Eli with cuts, matted hair, and no hearing aids. It was after this he was placed into foster care with Kronberg.
Tory, despite not being considered a risk as a parent and doing everything the courts told him to, was never considered a placement option for Eli at that time.
During one visit, Thaler allegedly told Eli that she was living off Mountain Dew and cigarettes, and that she couldn’t function, according to the social worker’s report.
The KARE11 report says that in April 2021, Thaler was caught stealing pain meds and needles from an Apple Valley Clinic. She was arrested for this incident.
Beth Dehner took over Eli’s case in July 2021, and Thaler’s reckless behaviors continued. She moved four times in four months, and quit going to therapy in October. She was kicked out of drug testing in November, as she was too disruptive.
Thaler actually assaulted a social worker by digging her nails into the worker’s hand and throwing garbage at her during one visit with Eli. She frequently slammed doors in the faces of social workers who picked up and dropped off Eli. During other visits, Thaler would stare off into space while Eli begged her to play with him.
“This woman is crazy,” the worker wrote to Beth Dehner.
Thaler’s rage blinded her with an attitude towards her son of “if I can’t have you, no one can” that is so prevalent among abusive personalities. To her, Eli wasn’t the toothless-grinning, adventurous little boy who was learning to ride a bike and wanted to be a heroic firefighter. No. To her, he was a weapon in a war against the man who she believed was taking everything from her. She didn’t want to hold herself accountable for her own actions that led to losing her son. But once she realized that tarnishing Tory’s name would make social services back off, she took that like a child who realized temper tantrums would get them whatever they wanted. And she used that.
Glenn Carruthers, in a 2016 study, “Making sense of spousal revenge filicide” points out that in order for mothers to use their children in this weaponized way, they first must dehumanize them. He adds that this is a deficit in her “person perception.”
These types of mothers build their identity and personality around their child, much in the same way narcissistic parents use their children as an extension of their personality, Carruthers notes. This dehumanizing of their child/children enables the mother to maintain control and power over her life and spouse. When the partner leaves, it guts her. Her world crumbles. And when her partner threatens to take the kids or acts on it, she loses any control leverage she had over that partner. And some people will do anything to get that back.
The partner’s departure rips away a piece of her identity, and so her remaining identity becomes entwined into her children. Whether she’s a good mother in the eyes of others doesn’t matter, only the fact she has possession of the kids at all costs.
Tory was moving on with his life, and planned on marrying a new woman. Yet, he refused to leave Eli behind. He refused to leave Thaler with the one thing she believed she had left in the world.
Carruthers also theorizes that mothers like this tie their “person perception” into an “in group” or an “out group.” The “in group” includes those who remain by her side, loyal to her, who believe her stories even when they aren’t true, and with whom she aligns her personal identity and social status. The “out group” are those who have left her or, in her eyes, have wronged her.
By leaving her, Tory effectively put himself in Thaler’s “out group.” It became easy for Thaler to dehumanize Tory into an enemy she needed to destroy.
But what about Eli? A child doesn’t always know how to be intentionally malicious. They learn that behavior from their environment. They typically just want their parents’ love and affection and attention. Their acceptance.
His father accepted him with the love and nurturing a child needs. Tory was a teacher, a dad, a friend to Eli.
Still, by walking into his dad’s loving arms, Eli also unintentionally set himself into Thaler’s “out group.” Her hatred and need for revenge against those who wronged her became fixated on her son. Not only did Eli seemingly betray her by wanting to be with his dad, Tory continued robbing her of her son. She felt the sting of the 2021 custody loss deeply and wanted to inflict that same pain upon Tory.
If Julissa couldn’t have Eli, then neither could Tory. No one would. She would make sure of that.
Who is protecting kids like Eli?
Some intriguing stats come from the Children’s Bureau in the US. According to their website, 88.9 percent of children exiting foster care in 2021 were discharged to a permanent home. Reunification with a parent made up 52.3 percent of these exits. If my math is correct, that means roughly 47 percent of kids taken from their parents are returned to them.
One can’t help but wonder when we hear of cases like Eli’s though — how often are kids returned to unstable and potentially dangerous parents?
According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, 391,641 children lived in foster care in 2021. That same year, about 214,542 left foster care. That 47 percent of kids reunited with their parents is actually down from 57 percent in 2020. Only 25 percent of foster kids, roughly 54,000, were adopted out, mostly to their foster families.
Eli was a stat in there, but his life has to mean more in the aftermath. Something that stuck out to me when news of this case first broke was something a family lawyer, Erin Turner, (not related to Eli’s case) told WCCO.
“The goal of child protection court is to reunite the child with the parent. It’s very difficult to terminate parental rights. There has to be a large amount of evidence. It’s everybody’s worst nightmare to get that wrong, and unfortunately sometimes that happens,” Turner said.
I said it then, and I will say it again. “Sometimes” feels like one too many in cases like this. How is this attitude acceptable? This child died because of bureaucratic runarounds. One file closed, and another had to be opened in order for more attention to be given to the way Thaler treated him and Tory. To continue calling it “child protection court” when it’s only goal is to send kids back to their parents, better or worse, seems to render that name void. Not all parents are a safe place.
Keith Roberts Johnson wrote in a 2013 paper titled “Beyond Professional Emergencies: Patterns of Mistakes in Social Work and Their Implications for Remediation” that while yes, social work is rife with complications and human mistakes, social workers also “face an impossible task in protecting children.” He calls it a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” profession.
Johnson, a former Child Protective Investigator (CPI), also acknowledges that rationalizing mistakes in social work this way isn’t enough.
He points out that the classification system used by physicians and CPIs alike remains based on the 1962 research by C. Henry Kempe, who coined the term “battered child syndrome” as a way of identifying repetitive traumatic injuries in children that indicate a pattern of abuse.
Kempe deemed this “a clinical condition in young children who have received serious physical abuse,” adding that any evidence of bone fractures, “subdural hematoma,” struggles to thrive, bruising, or swelling in a child who dies suddenly should be seriously questioned, as it presents the possibility of repeated trauma.
Johnson states that since the research on abuse and family dynamics has diversified so much since 1962, including the research on psychological impacts of abuse, that the old classification system is outdated, as is the old attitude.
“Errors in protecting children require a close examination of the nature of the everyday work of child protection, not rationalizations that workers are ‘damned if they do, and damned if they don’t,’” Johnson writes.
“Policy-oriented scholars watch the shifting laws, policies, and objectives of the system without realizing that the frontline work does not always change along with the policies and laws,” he continues. “This results in official and scholarly inquiries failing to provide a realistic assessment of the problems.”
He adds that a CPI doesn’t always focus on the child, as Kempe’s study would prefer, but they also look at the parents/guardians in order to find the roots of family dysfunction which social services might be able to resolve instead of simply removing the child from their family.
“This redirection of the investigative work turns child protection on its head, shifting focus away from the detective work of finding the cause of injury to the child to the social work of diagnosing the needs of adults,” Johnson says.
This runs the risk of focusing too much on the adults and not on the physical state of the child, he notes.
“Child fatalities from physical abuse are exceedingly rare, and are found in only 60 investigations out of 127,414 reports (IDCFS, 2012, Table 11),” he writes.
So, when those cases do come in, he says, they add to the pile of of routine “normal” family cases of neglect, unsupervised kids, or other cases not involving life-threatening abuse, and can fall through the cracks with an already strained CPI.
He compares it to the “low prevalence effect,” like a gun in that gets missed in a suitcase processed by an airport screener because their job becomes so routine.
And given the bad rep that social workers get every time a case like Eli’s happens, numerous workers leave the job and fewer take it on, leaving them short-staffed.
“All these cases require attention, and when a case of battering is mixed in with the routine family cases, it is likely to be overlooked and/or its seriousness to be misidentified,” Johnson writes.
To remedy this, Johnson says that “‘special rules’ are not the only solution; we need ‘special everything,’ from the orientation of the front-line workers to all their routines, including forms, procedures and laws that guide their work.”
KARE11, who did excellent coverage of this case, also conducted an investigation during which they obtained “hundreds of pages of emails between child protection workers, case worker notes, police reports, and court transcripts” which allegedly prove that Eli’s death was preventable.
They spoke with Dee Wilson, who formerly served as the director of Child Welfare for the national nonprofit Casey Family Programs, and now works as a consultant.
“There was absolutely no reason, no basis, for returning this child to this mother or continuing the placement once it was obvious she was not going to follow through on the case plan,” Wilson said of Eli’s case.
KARE11 found that despite the numerous abuse and neglect reports received about Thaler, caseworkers failed to act in Eli’s best interests and safety. Wilson accuses the caseworker of not taking Eli’s case seriously enough, and that the worker seemed to presume that only Eli’s immediate physical safety, not that of his future, was all that mattered.
Indeed, many reports KARE11 got indicated that Eli was being neglected and mentally abused, but not physically abused. Beth Dehner, Eli’s case worker, allegedly said various times that she was worried for his mental health, not his physical safety. This was in spite of multiple family members who had already voiced serious concerns over Eli’s physical safety with Thaler.
KARE11 cites a February 2023 report from Safe Passages for Children, a nonprofit child advocacy group, who found that 88 children in Minnesota have died from maltreatment since 2014. Fifty-nine of those cases were preceded by a history with child services.
Another factor in this case is the state law in Minnesota when children are removed from their parents. Within a year, they must be reunited with their parent, or begin the process of being placed into a different permanent home.
Sherri Larson, appointed by the court as a guardian to look out for Eli’s best interests, filed a court report to have Eli re-homed permanently. This would have stripped Thaler of her parental rights and given Eli to his father, though Thaler could have challenged it in court.
Dehner pointed out that Thaler was meeting some of the court conditions at that time, which would have complicated attempts to strip her of her parental rights.
When Eli was returned to Thaler for the home trial in December 2021, both Kronberg and Tory sent multiple emails to Dehner.
“We are just gonna forget every single bad thing that she has done these last 10 months?!” Kronberg wrote.
Dehner assured Kronberg that if the home trial didn’t go well, then Eli could be removed once more, placed with Tory, and they could file for a custody transfer.
That December, before the home trial, Thaler resorted to stalking Kronberg. Kronberg awoke for work early, at about 3 a.m., on December 20, 2021. She spotted Thaler and her roommate outside in a car with binoculars, watching the house. Kronberg called the police, and before she could confront Thaler, the car drove away.
Yet, instead of addressing Kronberg’s alarmed emails that she feared for her family’s safety, and that she wanted a restraining order against Thaler, Dehner simply called Eli’s school to let them know she was letting Eli go home to his mother two days early.
Upon returning home to his mother, teachers began expressing concerns about Thaler’s reckless driving when she dropped off or picked up her son. Thaler also continually called Larson, attempting to cancel Tory’s visits, then filing more Orders of Protection when that didn’t go her way. Larson wrote to Dehner that she was concerned about Thaler’s mental health and was considering removing Eli from the home trial.
“I feel like we need to vacate the (trial home visit) as she doesn’t appear stable to me and is putting Eli at risk,” she wrote in an email.
Still, Dehner maintained that there was no proof Eli was “physically unsafe” with his mother.
Teacher reports, however, contradicted this. By February, Eli’s behavior had become aggressive. He punched a kid at school. A teacher emailed Dehner to tell her about an incident regarding Eli.
“Eli proceeded to tell me that his mom pushes him. The other students seemed shocked by this example,” the teacher said.
Dehmer responded that this was “not something that CPS would take as a maltreatment report to assess unfortunately, however I do you want to keep documenting everything.”
In March, Eli told his teacher that his mom hurt him again. She asked him what his mother did, and he took her wrist and squeezed it.
Despite Dehner complaining that Thaler was “so mentally ill,” she and another worker still asked the judge to close the case.
“The kid has been going to school. She cooperated with a visit for dad last weekend. Kiddo is still going to therapy. That’s basically what she’s required to do at this point,” Dehner’s email to the worker said.
Larson protested: “I just can’t say right out close it without going on record expressing these concerns regarding how she’s impacting his mental health.”
Larson even told the court during a March 30 hearing that she felt Eli was not safe with his mother. During that hearing, the judge initially refused to close the case and scheduled another hearing for May. When it came time for that hearing, Larson only recommended closing the case so that Tory’s custody petition could go forward, hoping it would remove Eli from Thaler’s custody sooner.
Thaler was supposed to have resumed the parenting classes she had quit, but KARE11 reveals that Dehner never followed up on this.
Amy Horn, a social services staff member, picked Eli up for a visitation. She said he looked as though he hadn’t showered in days. He told her that he and his mom just drove around all night. She emailed Dehner, but Dehner didn’t bother updating the courts with the information as she’d already filed to have the case closed.
Horn said that she believed Dehner simply didn’t want to deal with Thaler anymore.
“Some workers are just lazy,” she said in a text to Eli’s stepmother.
Despite everything, Dehner wrote her final report regarding Thaler, mere weeks before Eli would be found dead in the trunk of his mother’s car.
“At the time of case closing,” Dehner said. “While there were some concerns about Julissa's parenting, there were no protection issues that required ongoing child protection placement or involvement.”
And yet, what now seems so preventable has left a family clambering for answers amidst guilt and grief. The foster mother who would have become a permanent home for Eli if it would have saved him. The father who heroically kept fighting for custody, and then took on child services in a lawsuit, to hold somebody accountable in a system that so tragically failed his son. The stepmother who would have shown Eli what a true mother should have been.
And simply out of a mother’s rage, selfishness, and boiling jealousy, he was ripped away from the family who loved him the most.
A community and a family, healing
Eli’s death sent ripples of devastation and hurt throughout the community of about 9000 people. One year later, the community got together for a fundraiser to redesign a playground at Surfside Park in memory of Eli Hart. Josephine told CBS that they think about Eli every day.
“There’s not a day we don’t. There’s not a day we don’t talk about him,” she said.
“Even while sleeping,” Tory added.
“Healing is something that we work on every day. Life doesn’t slow down when something like this happens,” Josephine went on. “Everyone else’s life that doesn’t know you or passes you on the street, their life still keeps going. You kind of feel like you’re lost. You are broken and in pieces, you’re trying to find those pieces and put them back together - and everyone’s just rushing by you on their day-to-day life. It’s hard to figure out where you’re at and figure out the next step forward.”
And that is what the playground is meant to do: to help the family and the community of Mound to heal. Volunteers need to raise about $200,000 for the project, but they’re dedicated to honoring Eli. On May 20, 2023, they held a silent auction to raise some money with hopes of breaking ground on the Eli Hart Memorial Playground by October.
Josie and Troy both said that spending time with Eli at playgrounds are some of their best memories of him.
At the time I first wrote this, the website dedicated to the playground said their goal was $340,000, and they were already at $211,584 — about 62 percent of the way there. In 2025, the park is now open. Today, the Eli Hart Foundation is a non-profit organization which turned their focus to “creating awareness and change for children suffering from domestic violence” now that the playground is complete. They are still accepting donations for their cause.
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Sources
KSTP
KARE11
KMSP