Could a woman that was once one of the heaviest in the world be too fat to be a killer? INSIDE EDITION spoke to the woman who was called "The Half-Ton Killer," but later cleared of the charges.
Mayra Rosales is one of the heaviest people in world, weighing nearly a half-a-ton. Her days were spent confined to her bed. She even relied on her husband to bathe her.
Mayra said, “I was not able to move at all.”
The wall of her home had to be sawed open just to get her out. It took 10 men to move her and take her to the hospital.
But Mayra never expected to find herself at the center of a homicide investigation.
It was a media frenzy. Camera crews swarmed around her, drawn by the enormity of her size and the fact that she was charged with, of all things, capital murder.
Nancy Grace even screamed on TV once, “This woman is almost a half-ton, why is she not in jail?”
Mayra was as “The Half Ton Killer.' The case will be featured in Half Ton Killer?, airing October 10, on TLC.
It all began in the small Texas town of La Joya, when her two-year-old nephew, Eliseo Jr. was rushed to the hospital. He was pronounced dead of blunt trauma to the head. Mayra told investigators an astonishing story, that she was to blame for the death.
“I had fallen on him by accident,” she said.
In her confession, she said she had tripped and accidentally fell on the boy. But an autopsy revealed a troubling discrepancy.
It said, It was an "Acute fracture. There was a scalp hematoma.”
The child had been struck in the head. Mayra was charged with murder.
“I was not afraid of going to jail,” she said.
But her attorney Sergio Valdez didn't buy it. He knew that Mayra wasn't mobile, she couldn’t move out of bed, so how could she fall on the child? Basically, Mayra was too fat to kill.
Valdez said, “Whats going on here? Who is covering up for who?”
Turns out, Myra was covering for her sister, Jaime.
“I just wanted to save my sister from going to jail,” she said.
It turned out that her sister, Jamie, had hit the boy with a hair brush in a fit of rage because he didn't want to eat his breakfast, and Mayra saw it happen. But why would she protect her sister?
"I was convinced I was dying,” said Mayra.
Mayra knew her weight was killing her, and Mayra didn't want her sister, who was raising three other children, to go to jail. So Myra took the rap.
Mayra recanted her confession and finally told cops what had really happened. Mayra was cleared of all charges. Her sister turned herself in and pled guilty to a lesser charge of causing injury to a child and was sentenced to 15 years.
“I wanted to live more than ever,” Mayra said.
Now, after the whole ordeal Mayra is a different woman. He doctor, Dr. Younan Nowzaradan surgically began removing fat from Mayra’s body. Mayra is exercising and eating a balanced diet. She has a long way to go, but she has already lost a staggering 500 pounds.
“I’m not only alive, I’m living my life,” she said.
