Grandma’s House: The Ezra and Uriel Schock Case

0:00 [MUSIC] After her little boy died at her parents' house, Kayla Shock stopped trusting her own mother. Her mom was a retired principal in Wichula, Florida, a Sunday school teacher who had spent almost 40 years around kids. Less than a year later, Kayla had a hair appointment and she asked her mom to watch her new baby girl. Kayla decided to trust her one more time. [MUSIC] If you grew up around Wichula, Florida, there's a decent chance Tracy Nix taught you something.

1:04 She spent almost 40 years in the Hardy County schools and she worked away up to principal at North Wichula Elementary and even after she retired, she went and took a job at a private school in town. Wichula is the county seat of Hardy County, out in farm country in the middle of the state. Tracy taught Sunday school and sang in the church choir. She and her husband Nay lived out off Kaizen Road with a pond near the house. Their oldest daughter Kayla married a guy named Drew. They had two boys, Asher and Ezra. Ezra was at his grandparents' house on December 22, 2021. He was 16 months old. He'd fallen asleep in a recliner and Nay, his grandpa was getting ready to run to Walmart. Nay left and Tracy dozed off. While she slept, Ezra got out of the house and made it under a fence and down to the pond. When Tracy woke up, a garage door was open a crack and she went looking.

1:59 She found him face down in the water. She pulled him out and started CPR immediately and the neighbor heard her screaming and when Nay got back, he did CPR too. They flew as Rath the Tampa General with a faint pulse. He died the next day. When Kayla heard, she raced toward her parents' place and ended up in a head-on wreck. She was pregnant at the time. Was anybody going to be charged for this? The sheriff's office wanted Tracy to be charged and the state attorney's office said no. Prosecutors said Florida's case law undrowning needs a caregiver who let the kid get to the water again and again. And to them, this looked like a one-time lapse so they couldn't prove culpable negligence. Kayla and Drew both said they stopped trusting Tracy after Ezra died.

2:48 Kayla also believed in second chances and wanted her mom and her life in the lives of her kids. She told reporters she kept wondering if she was overreacting because when your own mom spent her whole career running schools and teaching Sunday school at her church, you start to second-guess yourself. In the end, she let her mom back in with the kids. Kayla had a baby girl in March of 2022 and they named her "yurial Jane" for what "yurial means in Hebrew. God is my light." Drew said they took extra steps to protect the kids after Ezra and nobody said publicly what those steps were or whether they covered Tracy's baby sitting alone. Kayla had a hair appointment on Tuesday, November 1st, 2022 and she asked her mom to watch the baby. Tracy took "yurial" to lunch at Beef O'Brady's with three friends that she'd known for decades. The restaurant's camera caught Tracy walking in at 12.28 with "yurial" in her arms. If you'd been in a booth there at Beef O'Brady's, you'd have seen a grandma out with her friends and her baby granddaughter. Their lunch broke up at around 142.

3:56 Tracy got home at about 2 o'clock and she parked the Lexus in the yard with the engine off and the windows up. Yurial's car seat was in the back right behind the driver's seat. Tracy went into the house and talked to the dog. Then she sat down at the piano and practiced for what she later described as "a long time." And while she was there, it got up to about 90 degrees outside. Yurial was still in her car seat in the SUV. A little before 5 p.m. family started showing up and that's when Tracy remembered the baby. Rebecca Tracy's other daughter asked her, "Mom, how long has she been in the car?"

4:38 Tracy's answer was, "A while." Nay did CPR while Rebecca called 911. Fire Rescue pronounced "yurial dead" at 5 o'clock 1 p.m. She was 7 months old. Kayla found out when an officer showed up at her door and she told the jury that she had to go identify her own daughter. The medical examiner ruled it hyperthermia, meaning her body overheated and listed it as a homicide. A word medical examiner's used for any death caused by another person. So you'll see that on accidents as well. Detective Alice Fletcher interviewed Tracy with her body camera running and Tracy told her she just "forgot." The judge said later that in that interview, Tracy kept saying she wanted to leave and couldn't face the community. Tracy was charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child and with leaving a child in the car. Kayla went to reporters and you can find the interview where she said, "Her mom needed to go to prison." As her daughter, it kills me to say it. As their mother, I demand it.

5:42 Drew, her husband, asked how anybody forgets a little girl. The next spring, Nay told the court that Tracy needed help opening up and the judge let her go into an impatient program in St. Cloud and at the end of the hearing, Kayla, who hadn't spoken to her mom since the charges, walked over and hugged her, crying. There had been so much local coverage of this case that the jury got picked from a different county, Polk County. Before testimony, the judge ruled that the jury would not hear about Ezra. Tracy was never charged in Ezra's death and the jury had to decide Uriel's case on Uriel's evidence. So the jury in the case never even heard Ezra's name. The prosecutor played the video from the restaurant, Bifo Brady's, and then he walked the jury through Tracy's afternoon at home, the dog, and then the piano, while the Lexus the whole time sat there in the yard.

6:37 A crime scene tech testified that Uriel's car seat sat close enough to the driver's seat and the review mirror that Tracy should have known the baby was back there. The defense attorney argued that this was just a terrible accident that fell short of culpable negligence. He wanted a doctor who'd evaluated Tracy to tell the jury that she'd been on medications that can't impair memory and the judge kept that information out. And Tracy did not take the stand, which left her husband, Nay, as the only defense witness. The medical examiner told the jury, quote, "Nothing was noted to explain her death except that she was in a hot car." If you watched this case on court TV, they timed deliberations to the second and it came to just over two hours. The jury found Tracy not guilty of aggravated manslaughter, a charge that carried up to 30 years. They did find her guilty of leaving a child in a car for more than 15 minutes and causing great bodily harm. That one maxes out at five years. Tracy had been out on bond and she left that courtroom and handcuffs. Kayla stepped out when she saw it and afterward she said, "It's a win for justice for my daughter." The sentencing came on April 3rd, 2025 and this time the judge heard about both kids. Nay, Tracy's husband told the court that she mourned in silence after Yuriel died and hardly even went outside. Then Tracy spoke for herself.

8:06 She said Yuriel's car seat usually sat behind the passenger seat and that day it was behind the driver. Her exact words were, "She got quiet and I forgot she was there." She said maybe her medications played a part. She told the judge that she was in her own prison and it would last all her life and she said she would never hurt those babies on purpose. True, the kid's dad told the court that two of his children had died while Tracy was watching them and he said he couldn't understand why anybody in that courtroom was even debating whether she should go to prison. Kayla turned to face her mom and you can watch it on the courtroom video. She told her that she still loved her. Then she said, "I hate that I have to choose." The judge said that Tracy's explanations didn't match the evidence and he tied Yuriel's death back to Ezra's. He gave her the maximum five years in state prison with credit for time served and he asked for the people of Hardy County to leave Kayla and Drew's family in peace. Drew called five years a drop in the bucket. If you were to go look her up, Tracy is floored to inmate p72590 with the projected release date in July 2029. She has appealed her conviction and in June 2025 the judge denied her bond, writing that the appeal raised nothing fairly debatable and pointing to Ezra's death as part of why she was a danger to the community.

9:29 Kayla and Drew said after the synancing they could finally start to grieve. [Music] Thanks for listening to 10 Minute Murder, Bingeable True Crime. Hello, how's your mom and them? I'm Joe, the host, and here's an email, subject, question. Joe, how long have you been doing this? I tried to find out on the site and I couldn't tell. Just curious, you sound like somebody who's been at it a while. Thanks Pete and Saginaw, Michigan. Pete, thank you so much for listening and taking the time to send the email. And I until you ask that question, kind of lost track of it myself, but I can tell you that I started during the pandemic times. I was at home, got really bored, and I've always been really into a true crime. Also into like mysteries and things like that. All of the weird stuff I'm kind of into. And because I just happen to have a voiceover studio in my house because that's what I do for a living, I decided to start a true crime podcast. And as you can tell, if you go back to the earlier episodes, it was kind of rough. I didn't really know what I was doing and it's you can argue that I don't really know what I'm doing now. I'm always kind of winging in on here. I don't want to be like other people. I don't want to do a show that's similar to other people. I want to be kind of the alternative to those other true crime shows. Not that there's anything wrong with them. I enjoy true crime podcasts a lot. Now, I don't have a lot of time to listen to them anymore since I have my own,

11:03 but I want to do my own thing in a way that's I, if I was just a regular listener, I would hope to stumble upon. So that's the kind of show that I've created. And it's for people like us that are into true crime, maybe have a little bit of ADHD, but definitely don't have enough time to sit and listen to an hour or two of a true crime story. You know, I know Pete, you didn't ask me all that, but you get that one for free. All right, if you're a new listener to 10-minute murder, welcome. Make sure you hit subscribe, please. Also go to 10minutemurder.com. There you're going to find out more things about the podcast as well as where you can listen to the show in other places and links to social media. Follow 10-minute murder on Sodomysha. You OG listeners, I love you so much. Please keep doing what you're doing, sharing the show with your friends and your family, rating it five stars, wherever that's possible. And that's it. That's your episode for today. Thank you again for listening to 10-minute murder. See you next time.