A Montana grandmother has been sentenced to life in prison for torturing and killing her 12-year-old grandson, James 'Alex' Hurley. Patricia Batts, 55, pleaded guilty to deliberate homicide, felony criminal child endangerment, and witness tampering in May 2020.
Alex came to live with Batts and her husband, James Sasser, in Yellowstone, Montana, after his father, Tommy Tate, died in 2018 following complications from surgery after a accident that required multiple amputations, including both feet. Alex's mother, Alicia, who lived in Texas, agreed to let him stay in Montana to finish the school year.
By summer 2019, Alicia became concerned when Alex only communicated via text or Facebook messenger and said he was too busy to talk. She tried to bring him home but met resistance from Batts, who had taken Alex out of school in September 2019 under the guise of homeschooling. From then on, Alex was rarely seen outside the home.
The couple's daughter, Madison, testified that she witnessed her parents slapping, kicking, and punching Alex, putting him in chokeholds, and depriving him of love and attention. Alex died on February 3, 2020, from blunt force trauma to the back of his head. Paramedics found his bruised, malnourished body on the living room floor.
Batts initially claimed Alex had been self-harming and hearing voices, but investigators recovered footage of the torture from family members' phones. District Judge John C. Brown called it 'a horrific case of child abuse' and 'done with malevolence.' Batts said only, 'I regret not being the grandmother Alex should have had.' Sasser was sentenced to 100 years in 2022.
