Published Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022 | 8:36 a.m.
Updated Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022 | 4:31 p.m.
Brandon Lee Toseland
A note that a Las Vegas schoolgirl gave her teacher saying her mother was being held captive and thought the girl's brother was dead led to the discovery of the boy’s body in a garage freezer and the arrest of the mother’s boyfriend on murder and kidnapping charges, authorities said Wednesday.
The boyfriend, Brandon Lee Toseland, 35, was arrested Tuesday after police saw him leave his house with the mother in a vehicle in which officers also found handcuffs, Las Vegas homicide Lt. Ray Spencer said.
Spencer said the woman later told detectives Toseland sometimes used the restraints to keep her in his custody, and that she had not seen her 4-year-old son since Dec. 11, when she said Toseland told her the boy had become sick and “that it was too late.”
“I remember that quote,” Spencer told The Associated Press. “There are still a lot of questions that we don’t have answers to.”
Later, Toseland told the mother the boy was dead, police said in Toseland's arrest report, “and said she would not be allowed to see his body because he would lose his freedom.” The report noted that Toseland never called police or paramedics.
Police said in a statement the woman told detectives she had been abused by Toseland and was not allowed to leave the house alone or enter the garage. Spencer said detectives obtained a warrant to enter the house and found the boy’s frozen body.
Clark County School District police Lt. Bryan Zink declined to specify the boy’s sister’s grade level or identify the elementary school where he said the teacher gave the note to administrators who notified police. Zink said he believed the mother wrote the note.
Toseland made an initial court appearance Wednesday on two kidnapping charges before a Las Vegas judge who ordered him to remain jailed pending an appearance Thursday on an open murder charge. It was not immediately clear if Toseland hired a lawyer to represent him.
An attorney who represented Toseland when he pleaded no contest to misdemeanor domestic battery in 2019 in Las Vegas did not immediately respond Wednesday to messages from AP.
Spencer said police were still gathering evidence in the case. He said the boy's body was intact but bore visible injuries that led investigators to believe he was physically abused. Spencer declined to describe the injuries.
A cause of death will be determined by the Clark County coroner.
The mother told police that Toseland “was disciplining the boy extensively,” Spencer said.
The woman and her daughter were not immediately identified. The Associated Press is withholding the boy's name to avoid immediately identifying possible victims of unspecified abuse.
Spencer said the girl was being cared for by relatives in Las Vegas and the mother, who he said is in her late 20s, was still being questioned by police.
He said the woman and Toseland had been together for about a year. Property records show Toseland owns the house where the boy’s remains were found.
Spencer said he didn’t immediately know if Toseland was employed, but said he believed the mother of the two children had a job prior to Dec. 11. He declined to say where.
“We don’t know if she worked after that date,” he said.
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Associated Press writer Paul Davenport in Phoenix contributed to this report.
