Testimony in Nashville fire that killed 9-month-old: Mother knew 'no one was inside the apartment,' detective says

A Nashville mother jailed on a murder charge stemming from an apartment fire that killed an infant and injured five others told police she knew no adult was home when she left the children to go to a club, according to new information released in court Friday.

Gevona Smith, 26, was one of two mothers indicted last month on murder and neglect charges in connection with the July 7 fire at Hickory Lane Apartments.

“She knew definitively when they left no one was inside the apartment," Metro police detective Chris Bowden testified Friday in Davidson County Criminal Court during a two-hour hearing in which Smith's attorney asked a judge to reduce her $150,000 bond.

Smith remained jailed Friday after Judge Steve Dozier denied her attorney's bond-reduction request for reasons including that she has no local long-term ties, no job and could face a life sentence if convicted.

Smith's co-defendant in the case, 24-year-old Ryana Davenport, was also indicted on a first-degree murder charge in connection with the blaze that killed her daughter Jream Jenkins, who was 9 months old. The fire also injured five other children including Davenport's 2-year-old son who suffered major burns to his body, Bowden testified. 

On the stand Friday, Bowden said that although Davenport told Smith someone was going to watch the kids, Smith said she never saw anyone go into the apartment.

Additional testimony revealed Smith moved from Atlanta to Linden, Tennessee, in May, and around the time of the fire, had been in Nashville with four of her children, ages 7 and under, visiting Davenport and her two children for an extended July 4 holiday.

Smith, family testified, had previously been in nursing school in Atlanta but was not employed at the time of the fatal fire.

In interviews with Bowden, Smith said that Davenport woke her up at 11 p.m. the evening before the early morning fire and said they were going to a club.

She said Davenport told her a woman she knew in the complex was going to watch the children, Bowden testified. Smith also told the detective that earlier at 7 p.m. the two moms gave the kids melatonin to sleep and lit candles.

As they left to go to the club, Bowden's testimony revealed, Davenport waved to a person outside the apartment and said, "That’s who is watching the kids."

After the fire happened, Smith told police and her mother, Tasha Smith, that she should have checked to see who the person was and confirmed they were in the home.

Police later recovered video of both mothers going to a club as well as social media posts of them there, the detective testified.

Davenport, who remained jailed on $250,000 bond Friday, also faces two counts of aggravated child neglect, four counts of child neglect and two counts of aggravated child endangerment.

Her attorney said Friday he had not filed a motion to have his client's bond reduced.

Both women are due back in court for another hearing on the case in December.

The fire

Six children age 6 or younger were home where Jream lived with her mother and 2-year-old brother on July 7. 

Nashville police reported that on the day of the fire, Davenport and Smith went to a club before the blaze broke out at 2 a.m. in the 2900 block of Apache Trail.

The other four children who survived, some of whom are Smith's children, were hospitalized for several days after the fire. 

On Friday, Tasha Smith said her four grandchildren who suffered smoke inhalation in the fire remained with a foster family on Friday but had recovered physically. 

Witnesses of the fire reported one of the children, Gevona Smith's 6-year-old son, ran out of the building screaming for help. 

Both mothers initially told police there was a babysitter with the children in the apartment, police said, but a babysitter was not at the scene of the fire when officials arrived. 

The mothers returned to the apartment complex after firefighters and police officers were on the scene, police said.

All of the children involved are related to each other because they share the same father, according to police.

Reach Natalie Alund at nalund@tennessean.com and follow her on Twitter @nataliealund.