How three Ohio moms helped save a 'dying' girl

CANTON, Ohio ‒ It may take a village to raise a child, but three determined moms helped rescue one.

Meet Stacy Corp, Katie Marskell and Katie Fisher.

All three 40-something Stark County moms were friends of Lindsey Abbuhl, who will go to prison on Jan. 6. She was convicted last month in Stark County Common Pleas Court for crimes she committed while parading her "dying" daughter across the country, which elicited sympathy and prompted gifts and donations.

Assistant Stark County Prosecutor Seth Marcum said Abbuhl likely suffers from Munchausen syndrome by proxy. It's a mental illness where a parent makes up or causes ailments in their own own child for attention.

Perhaps the most famous example of Munchausen by proxy is the Missouri case of Dee Dee Blanchard and her daughter, Gypsy Rose, subjects of the 2019 Hulu series "The Act."

In Abbuhl's case, all three moms were among those who believed her stories, at least in the beginning. That her then-10-year-old girl was sick and getting sicker by the day. By March 2021, Abbuhl told people her daughter had weeks to live, due to a failure of her "central nerve system."

"At one point, (the girl) told me she just wanted to die and go to heaven," Fisher recalled.

Just repeating the words brings tears to Fisher's eyes.

It was all a lie.

Three strangers come to the same conclusion

Although the three moms were friends with Abbuhl, they were largely strangers to one another. Abbuhl had a knack for creating isolated pods of friends. To this day, Fisher and Corp haven't met in person.

But as Abbuhl's tales of her daughter's certain death grew more urgent and detailed, the three moms separately became increasingly suspicious. Too many stories didn't add up.

Their respective epiphanies that Abbuhl was lying arrived at different junctures. Corp was probably first; she'd known Abbuhl for the longest. Next came Marskell. Lastly, it was Fisher.

So, each decided to do what they said a good mom does: Protect the child at any cost.

"It's my responsibility to help an innocent child," Marskell said.

Behind the scenes, in their own unique ways, the trio played a role in an outcome that saw the girl move in with her dad, and Abbuhl plead guilty to theft and child endangering.

"It's a combination of relief and disgust," Fisher said.

The girl is doing fine these days, and her dad, Jamie Abbuhl, has requested privacy. The Canton Repository isn't naming the girl in this story because she is a victim.

Fool me once, twice ...

"I think this individual ... fooled a lot of people," said Rob Myers, deputy director of children services for Stark County Job & Family Services, which received seven calls related to the girl, dating back to 2018, according to a Stark County sheriff's probe opened in April 2021.

A lot of people indeed.

They gave their time, money and hearts. Bowlers in a weekly benefit league at AMF Hall of Fame Lanes. Wishes Can Happen. GoFundMe donors. Compassion Delivered, which provided free meals. Whispering Grace Horses. Coaches and players from the Walsh and Malone university softball teams, who held an indoor scrimmage to honor the girl. College players from around the U.S, who made video well-wishes. Texas A&M University, which hosted mom and daughter for a weekend.

And on and on.

The worst part, perhaps, is Abbuhl's daughter believed she was dying.

The girl had even written a 20-item bucket list. She asked Fisher if her husband, Paul, would be a pallbearer. She picked five funeral songs. She said people should dress in bright colors at the event. And she wanted to wear a pair of jeans and flannel shirt in her casket. All of it, Fisher said, at Abbuhl's prompting.

"Looking back, I can realize she was the most manipulative person I've ever known," said Fisher.

The Repository had requested an interview for this story with Abbuhl, through her attorney Paul Kelley, but received no response.

Softball ties that bound

Lindsey Abbuhl is 35 years old. She was married for seven years to Jamie Abbuhl, before the couple began divorce proceedings for a third and final time in 2017.

That's when Corp met Abbuhl. Like Marskell and Fisher later, she was introduced and bonded to Abbuhl by girls' fastpitch softball.

Abbuhl's daughter loved the game. So did the daughters of Marskell and Fisher, who played on different teams with her. Corp worked for the Akron Racers pro team; she met Abbuhl at the team's Firestone Stadium.

Corp and Abbuhl hit it off.

They spent a lot of time together.

Early on, Abbuhl's daughter wasn't even the subject of health problems, save for the time she'd suffered a near-drowning experience in 2015. An event that by all appearances rang true, though a sheriff's investigation later cast doubt on the validity of many details.

But in 2017, Abbuhl herself was the one in apparent health crisis. She said she had cancer. A photo from that period even shows her and others wearing "Team Lindsey" T-shirts.

In a Repository story last year, Jason and Emily Sigala said that's when Abbuhl had groomed them to adopt her daughter. They believed, for a while in 2017 and 2018, that when a brain tumor finally claimed Abbuhl's life, her daughter would move in with them.

Abbuhl's cancer proclamation seemed believable.

The sheriff's investigation noted how officials at Perry Local Schools' — where the girl attended — had even arranged counseling to help her cope with the inevitable death of her mom.

However, Abbuhl's health problems vanished; the Sigalas realized an adoption was never going to happen.

It's unclear if Abbuhl had cancer.

It also wasn't the first time Abbuhl told people she had cancer. Her ex-husband informed a sheriff's detective that Abbuhl said she had cancer when they began dating a dozen years ago. He said he caught her lying about supposed trips to Cleveland for treatment.

Shortly after, in 2019, Abbuhl's daughter was the one who was ill.

Abbuhl began to tell friends, and post on social media, details of an endless barrage of mystery ailments and afflictions. She shared photos, urged prayers and posted messages like this:

"This little lady is my best friend! Continue to say prayers for her as we navigate through her medical concerns. We don't know what her future holds, and we don't know if tomorrow will come for her each time we go to bed but the prayers and faith of all those we love helps keep us going!"

So many stories, so many lies

"We'd started hanging out a little bit," Marskell explained. "Right off the bat, we're sitting on my couch, talking. She's telling me how she'd been gang-raped; how her ex beat her; she just spilled it out and I fell for all of it."

Looking back, Marskell said it was all lies.

By late 2019, Abbuhl had removed her daughter from Perry schools and was home schooling her. Abbuhl told friends the girl was bullied, or that district officials kicked her out, for no reason.

However, the sheriff's investigation would reveal the girl was absent more days than she was in school. School leaders demanded Abbuhl provide notes from physicians to back up illness excuses. She never provided them. Instead, she simply pulled the girl out of school.

"To know (the girl) is to love her; so smart and sweet," Marskell said

In fact, Abbuhl's daughter still has a profile on the Marskell home streaming TV services, such as Hulu and Netflix, because she spent a lot of time there in 2019 and 2020.

Abbuhl continued to speak of and post about countless tests and procedures her daughter endured.

For much of 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Abbuhl planned fundraisers for her daughter, according to the sheriff's case file. The money was to pay for doctor visits, as physicians, in unison, supposedly scratched their heads.

There were bowling events. Other times, Abbuhl asked for donations on Facebook. She began to sell face masks, wristbands and travel mugs, all inscribed with a hastag, followed by her daughter's name and the word "warriors."

Marskell was on board.

Until the time Marskell said she drove the girl to a music lesson in Hartville. It was shortly after she'd supposedly been intubated at a hospital, and been told she may have leukemia.

The girl, however, didn't know much about any of it.

"That was my first red flag," Marskell recalled.

During that same time period in late 2020, Fisher's friendship with Abbuhl was beginning to strengthen. Meanwhile, Corp's relationship with Abbuhl had largely disintengrated, though they remained in contact from time to time.

It wasn't long before circumstances would bring the three moms — Marskell, Fisher and Corp — together.

And working for common goals.

The epiphanies fall into place

Fisher helped arrange an event that drew nationwide attention on Feb. 26, 2021. Abbuhl's daughter was guest of honor at Hall of Fame Fitness Center for a Walsh vs. Malone indoor scrimmage game.

It was a feel-good story amid sadness over the girl's terminal illness. It was a special day where she threw out the first pitch and served as coach. A time for a sorority of sisters in the softball world across the country to respond with encouraging videos, prayers and plenty of merchandise.

Fisher was Abbuhl's shoulder to lean on.

And Fisher and her husband, Paul, were heartbroken and eager to help. In the weeks after that game, they even fixed up and painted a house Abbuhl had purchased in Plain Township (one of the girl's supposed bucket list wishes).

Paul Fisher was so intent to finish the Abbuhl's new home that he sometimes started at 5 a.m., before he went to work.

"I just want (the girl) to have one night in that house," he'd tell his wife, while in tears.

But soon the Fishers got privately irritated after Abbuhl showed up at the house and complained about the color of a room, for example. Or the incessant odor of stale smoke. Or the fact the garage didn't seem as clean as it should be, even after it was power-washed.

"It was strange," Fisher said.

Meanwhile, Marskell had reached out to others, including to introduce herself to Corp. They met at Panera Bread. Marskell was gathering confirmation for her suspicion the girl was not dying after all.

She got it.

She also reached out to Jamie Abbuhl, the girl's dad. They became friends. Together, they drove to Akron Children's Hospital in a failed attempt to obtain medical records. But they were making noise.

Fisher and her husband started to dissect previous texts with Abbuhl; they began to have doubts.

But it seemed that every time they began to pull away, they were reeled back in. Abbuhl sent urgent late-night texts. Her daughter had stopped breathing, she wrote. It was dire.

"I'm working on her," Abbuhl texted.

"Is she breathing?" Fisher asked.

She could almost visualize an image of Abbuhl pounding on her daughter's chest and giving her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Abbuhl said she was at home, then said she was at Aultman Hospital.

Her daughter had supposedly been placed on a breathing tube, but then was home and fine the next morning.

It made no sense.

Then, Abbuhl said her daughter was in kidney and liver failure and she had stopped producing bone marrow.

Fisher knew it was a lie.

But it was times like this Abbuhl had her daughter tell Fisher about her funeral and make the pallbearer request. Fisher was torn. She'd quit accepting donations to the GoFundMe.

"But what if I'm wrong, and I'm about to accuse a mom whose daughter is dying?" Fisher asked herself.

The breaking point, she said, came the Sunday after Easter. Fisher went to the weekly bowling fundraising event, but tried to keep her distance. Abbuhl told her the girl was having seizures again and was vomiting blood. Doctors wanted her in the emergency room.

"Kiddo, you gotta go, so the doctors can fix you," Fisher told the girl.

The next morning, Fisher checked in with Abbuhl to see how the girl was recovering in the hospital after a long night. Abbuhl said she decided not to go to the hospital after all.

"That was it; that was the point," Fisher said. "I mean c'mon."

She contacted a friend at the Stark County Sheriff's Office, who referred her to detective Amber Davis.

Investigation and conviction

On April 21, 2021, Davis logged her first report. Fisher soon delivered a folder of information, including text message strings with Abbuhl and details about donations she'd helped secure.

Corp, known as anonymous source #1 in the case file, pointed Davis to a bevy of people who'd crossed paths with Abbuhl. And she and Marskell remained in contact with each other.

"It's really about those two moms, not so much me," Corp said. "They were the ones. I guess you could say I'm the one who helped get (Davis) to all the people she needed to do her job."

On May 11, Marskell handed Davis a thumb drive of text message screen shots with Abbuhl, Facebook screen shots, information about fundraising plans and ideas, along with a timeline of events during her friendship with Abbuhl.

Two days later, on May 13, Children Services and Davis went to Abbuhl's house and removed the girl from her custody. Children Services had planned to ask a Stark County Family Court judge to give it emergency temporary custody. However, it wasn't necessary.

Because at the same time, Jamie Abbuhl and his attorney requested temporary custody of his daughter through the divorce case. It was granted. Ultimately, he got permanent custody.

On Nov. 17 this year, Abbuhl and her attorney appeared in Common Pleas Court before Judge Chryssa Hartnett. Abbuhl agreed to a plea deal through a bill of information, a process that speeds past an indictment and trial and goes straight to conviction and sentencing.

Marskell and Corp came to watch.

So did Davis, the detective who'd spent hundreds of hours investigating the case. She'd since retired from the Sheriff's Office, but she also wanted to witness a bit of closure, as well.

Hartnett sentenced Abbuhl to four to six years in prison. Abbuhl can apply for a chance of early release after six months. She also must pay $8,590 in restitution, some of it to Fisher.

The judge told Abbuhl that moms don't act that way; Hartnett said her actions were abuse.

"You threw your child in front of you," the judge told her.

Abbuhl is to report to the Stark County Jail on Jan. 6.

Epilogue: The near drowning that wasn't

During an interview with The Repository at the Walsh-Malone game, Abbuhl said her daughter had two months to live. The cause of her central nerve sytem failure, she said, was a mystery to doctors, though she said they suspected the girl's June 17, 2015 near drowning was to blame.

Some of Abbuhl's friends knew of the drowning incident, too.

That story sounded so real, even if others weren't.

After all, there was a 2017 legal settlement that had netted the girl about $60,000, according to Stark County Probate Court records. The money had been placed in a trust for her until she's 18 years old.

But even that wasn't as it seemed.

Abbuhl's account was that her daughter "died" that day at Jellystone Park in Lake Township, while on a swimming trip with a church daycare class. That her daughter was brought back to life after several people performed CPR. That an emergency rescue squad rushed her to Akron Children's Hospital.

As part of her investigation, Davis interviewed the church's daycare director to see if there was more to the story.

The director told Davis that Abbuhl's daughter came down a water slide and got a mouth full of water — and that was it.

No one provided CPR, she said.

In fact, the girl continued on with her day. However, daycare policy required a phone call to mom. Abbuhl responded by saying she wanted her daughter taken to Children's Hospital. Records of her hospital arrival back up that story, as no medical issues were noted.

Anything else, Davis asked?

The director went on to tell the detective that Abbuhl had recently been fired from the church, for allegedly faking an injury. And that she'd attempted to sue them over the dismissal.

Reach Tim at 330-580-8333 or tim.botos@cantonrep.com On Twitter: @tbotosREP

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: How these Ohio moms exposed Lindsey Abbuhl's 'dying' daughter story