John Jefferson
Lisa Campbell-Goins (Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office).
At first, doctors could not come up with a medical diagnosis for the 7-year-old Texas girl who suffered from ulcers in her GI tract and damage to her colon and lower intestine.
But then family members came up with a startling theory: The girl’s grandmother, who was her primary caregiver, had been poisoning her.
After an investigation, police determined the 56-year-old grandmother, Lisa Campbell-Goins, had been sending down an alkaline-like substance, possibly a degreaser, down the girl’s feeding tube, a probable cause arrest affidavit obtained by Dallas Fox affiliate KDFW said.
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The Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office determined the medical child abuse was a case of Munchausen by proxy syndrome, a Facebook post said. The disorder is “characterized by fabrication or induction of signs or symptoms of a disease,” according to the National Institutes of Health.
Detectives believe Campbell-Goins was placing the unnecessary gastric feeding tube in her granddaughter in order to cause her medical problems. They also suspect she may have been drumming up sympathy for the girl so she could set up a GoFundMe account to obtain monetary funds.
Deputies last week arrested Campbell-Goins on charges of exploitation of a child, injury to a child and unlawful restraint. She sits the Tarrant County Corrections Center on a $150,000 bond.
According to the affidavit, Campbell-Goins had taken care of the girl since she was an infant. The grandma had reportedly taken her granddaughter to Cook Children’s Medical Center in Fort Worth in August 2023 for severe dehydration, vomiting and diarrhea. Doctors are said to have been baffled by the girl’s GI problems because the “illness presentation did not match a known medical diagnosis.”
As doctors gave her a gastric tube for medication, Campbell-Goins allegedly pushed for them to also feed her through the tube. The girl’s condition improved but then reverted back to the same problems. The affidavit reportedly said that in January 2024 family members contacted cops to say they believed Campbell-Goins was poisoning the girl through the feeding tube.
Since Campbell-Goins is not the girl’s legal guardian, staff was able to kick her out of the hospital. The girl’s condition suddenly improved with the grandmother gone, the affidavit reportedly said. The investigation reportedly revealed Campbell-Goins had been sending down Mean Green Degreaser down the girl’s tube. She also reportedly may have used fingernail polish remover as it was found in the bedrooms of both Campbell-Goins and her granddaughter.
Detectives believe Campbell-Goins had also been using sedatives to control the girl.
Shockingly, this is not the first time Campbell-Goins has been accused of medically abusing a child. KDFW reports that she allegedly overmedicated her son in 1999. She was reportedly ordered to take parenting classes.
As for the most recent case, detectives want to know if anyone donated to Campbell-Goins’ alleged scam on her GoFundMe page. Anyone who did is asked to contact Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office Det. Michael Weber at 817-884-3749.
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