State records describe supervision failures in a 2021 infant death at a center connected to the owner of Kid University.
BARTLETT, Tenn. — An infant died in 2021 at a Memphis-area child care center owned by the same operator whose Kid University facility closed after 6-year-old Winter Jones died in August, according to state records and reporting based on a Department of Children’s Services investigative file.
The earlier case involved Colt Adkins, who was nearly 3 months old when he died July 14, 2021, after being found unresponsive at Ivy League Learning Center #2 in Bartlett. The newly renewed attention to his death comes as investigators and state regulators examine what happened to Winter at Kid University in Cordova and as scrutiny expands to other facilities linked to owner Raven Marshall-Lewis.
A redacted Department of Children’s Services report reviewed by WREG said an allegation of lack of supervision in Colt’s case was confirmed. The report listed his cause of death as suffocation due to an unsafe sleep environment. State child care records also showed supervision violations at the center in connection with the incident.
Records and subsequent reporting indicate Colt had been placed on his stomach for supervised “tummy time,” but was not moved to a crib after falling asleep. State findings also said staff failed to provide the level of supervision required for an infant of his age and failed to make required physical checks. The details have drawn new attention because the case involved another child death at a facility under Marshall-Lewis’ ownership.
The Tennessee Department of Human Services told WREG that the center’s director reported finding an infant who was not breathing. An educator performed CPR, 911 was called and emergency personnel continued efforts to revive the child before he was taken to Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital. The child did not survive.
The 2021 death had been reflected only partly in publicly accessible child care compliance information. Online records showed supervision violations at Ivy League Learning Center #2, but those entries did not by themselves make clear that a child had died. The fuller circumstances emerged through a review of state child-welfare records and related reporting.
That distinction has become significant after Winter’s death because families evaluating child care centers can view state inspection and compliance histories online. Those histories may document violations without providing all of the circumstances surrounding a serious incident. The 2021 case is now part of a broader examination of whether publicly available records give families enough context to understand a facility’s safety history.
Winter died Aug. 13 after she was found unresponsive in a vehicle at Kid University in Cordova. Her family said the nonverbal, autistic 6-year-old was supposed to be transported from the day care to school that morning but remained on the vehicle until the afternoon. Memphis police, the Department of Children’s Services and the Department of Human Services began investigations following her death.
A state fatality inspection conducted after Winter died found five areas of noncompliance involving transportation. Inspectors said staff did not perform a required walk-through after children were unloaded, the transportation log was not accurately completed and documentation of required transportation training was unavailable. Staff also told inspectors that the vehicle did not have a child-monitoring device.
DHS later said the monitoring-device requirement depended on the children being transported and that during an earlier June inspection, the center reported the vehicle was being used for school-age children who did not meet the conditions that would require such a device. After Winter’s death, however, inspectors documented the absence of a monitoring device among the transportation violations identified during the fatality visit.
Kid University surrendered its license after Winter’s death and permanently closed. Other child care centers tied to Marshall-Lewis were not automatically affected by that closure, according to state officials. Records reviewed by local news organizations show she has operated several other facilities in Shelby County, including Ivy League Learning Center locations, Klassy Kids locations, Imagine Academy and Yaya’s Place.
The earlier infant death does not establish that the circumstances surrounding Colt’s death and Winter’s death were the same. The incidents occurred five years apart, at different facilities and under different circumstances. Both cases, however, involved state findings concerning child supervision or safety at centers connected through common ownership.
Marshall-Lewis has not publicly responded to repeated requests from local news organizations seeking comment about Winter’s death and the broader safety history of her child care businesses. No response from her addressing the newly renewed attention to Colt’s 2021 death had been reported in the material reviewed for this story.
Winter’s death remains under investigation. Local reporting has said the case was being prepared for presentation to a grand jury, while state agencies continued their reviews. No criminal charge against Marshall-Lewis was identified in the records and reports reviewed for this article.
Author note: Last updated September 6, 2026.