Investigators found queries about bruises and unconsciousness before a 2-year-old boy suffered the fatal injury that led to Brianna Bloyer’s conviction.
UNIONTOWN, Pa. — Days before 2-year-old Bentlee Myers was found critically injured inside a Fayette County home, a cellphone later seized by investigators had been used to search for ways to make bruises disappear and to ask how long a facial carpet mark might last.
Those searches became one strand in a much larger murder case against Brianna Bloyer, the woman caring for Bentlee when he suffered the head trauma that killed him in August 2024. Investigators would eventually combine the digital record with medical findings, witness testimony and Bloyer’s own statements. Nearly two years later, a jury convicted the 32-year-old of third-degree murder. On Aug. 27, 2026, a Fayette County judge sentenced her to 20 to 40 years in prison, the maximum term prosecutors said could be imposed for the offense.
Police did not rely on a single search or message to explain what happened to Bentlee. Instead, prosecutors presented the phone activity as a timeline that existed alongside physical signs of repeated injury. Authorities said the device showed searches for “homemade bruise cream” and for something that could make bruises fade overnight. Another query asked how long an imprint from carpet would remain on a face. Investigators also found searches concerning anger during pregnancy. Then, on Aug. 16, the morning Bentlee was discovered in grave condition, the phone was used to search for information about helping a person regain consciousness.
The last of those searches occurred shortly before someone else called 911. Testimony at a preliminary hearing placed a search about making someone “come to” at 11:39 a.m., roughly 15 minutes before the emergency call. The caller was a Head Start teacher who had come to the Old Lake Lynn Road home for an appointment involving another child. She found Bloyer upset about Bentlee, went to the toddler and recognized that he needed immediate help. Emergency responders testified that the boy was not breathing and appeared blue. Bloyer’s own phone records did not show that she had called 911 for him.
Bentlee was rushed from the Springhill Township home to WVU Medicine Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown, West Virginia. Doctors found a severe brain injury and extensive signs of trauma. Reports based on court records described bruising on multiple areas of his body and other injuries, while prosecutors told jurors that cuts and bruises were in different stages of healing. Bentlee was declared brain dead and died Aug. 19. A coroner attributed his death to blunt force trauma to the head. The condition of his body gave investigators a reason to examine not only what occurred on Aug. 16 but also how he had been treated in the days and weeks beforehand.
Bloyer initially told investigators that Bentlee had been staying with her for about two weeks and said that, when she woke him on Aug. 16, he stumbled before collapsing. Other evidence produced a different account. State police testified that Bloyer admitted becoming angry with the toddler and throwing him from the kitchen area toward the living room, after which she heard a thud. District Attorney Mike Aubele later said Bloyer acknowledged picking up and tossing the child, causing him to strike his head hard. A Head Start teacher testified Bloyer had said Bentlee hit his head on a coffee table.
The delay in obtaining medical help became another important part of the prosecution. Aubele said Bloyer did not immediately summon an ambulance after the head injury. By the prosecutor’s account, at least 20 minutes and possibly as much as an hour passed before the Head Start teacher arrived and began CPR. The state argued that the lack of an emergency call from Bloyer, especially when considered with the search about reviving an unconscious person, was relevant to what she knew about Bentlee’s condition. The prosecution also presented the earlier searches about bruises as evidence that she was aware of prior injuries before the fatal episode.
That digital history mattered because each query could be placed on a clock and compared with other evidence. A search about bruising did not by itself prove who caused an injury. A query about unconsciousness did not establish how a person became unconscious. At trial, prosecutors therefore put the cellphone evidence beside medical testimony and admissions attributed to Bloyer. Jurors also heard that Bentlee had multiple injuries in different stages of healing. The state’s case asked them to view the searches not as isolated internet activity but as part of the circumstances surrounding repeated harm to a child who was dependent on adults for his safety and medical care.
The investigation also examined the conduct of Bentlee’s father, Brett Bissett. Authorities said Bissett had been aware of Bloyer’s volatility and of previous episodes involving his son, though prosecutors did not accuse him of being at the home when Bentlee sustained the fatal injury. Local trial coverage reported that Bissett later cooperated with the prosecution and pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter. His role provided additional context for the state’s claim that the final injury came after earlier warning signs, while the murder prosecution remained focused on Bloyer as the person who caused the head trauma.
Bloyer did not ultimately receive the first-degree murder conviction prosecutors sought. The homicide case had initially exposed her to the possibility of a more severe outcome, and prosecutors once intended to pursue the death penalty. In March 2026, Aubele withdrew that option, while continuing to seek a first-degree murder conviction carrying an automatic life sentence. When the case went to the jury in August, jurors were allowed to consider lesser homicide offenses. After about three hours of deliberations, they selected third-degree murder, rejecting the state’s effort to prove the premeditation required for first-degree murder.
The defense viewed that distinction as significant. Assistant public defender Gregory Kunkel said after the verdict that jurors had recognized the case did not establish first-degree murder. He also said the defense would review legal objections raised during the trial, including disputes involving evidence and courtroom issues. For prosecutors, however, the third-degree verdict still represented a murder conviction supported by a record that included Bentlee’s injuries, the emergency-response timeline, Bloyer’s statements and the phone searches. Aubele said the state had hoped for first-degree murder but was satisfied that Bloyer had been convicted of murder.
The remaining question after the verdict was punishment. Prosecutors announced that they would seek the maximum third-degree murder sentence, and Judge Joseph George Jr. imposed it on Aug. 27: a minimum of 20 years and a maximum of 40 years in prison. Aubele thanked law enforcement, emergency workers, hospital personnel, witnesses and relatives who participated in the case. The sentencing came almost exactly two years after Bentlee’s death and transformed evidence once described in charging papers as allegations into part of the record underlying Bloyer’s conviction.
The internet searches remain among the case’s most distinctive pieces of evidence because they recorded questions asked before the fatal emergency unfolded. Their significance at trial came from their placement beside other proof rather than from the wording alone: bruises doctors said were at different stages of healing, a child who was later found unresponsive, an admitted act of anger, and a failure by Bloyer to make the call that brought emergency personnel to the home. Together, those pieces formed the prosecution’s account of what happened inside the Springhill Township residence and why Bentlee’s death was a homicide rather than an unexplained accident.
Bloyer is now serving a 20-to-40-year sentence for third-degree murder. Her attorneys previously said they would evaluate potential appellate issues after trial and sentencing. Unless a reviewing court changes the judgment, the jury’s verdict and George’s maximum sentence stand as the legal resolution of the murder case against her.
Author note: Last updated September 21, 2026.