Former American Idol singer Syesha Mercado has emotionally opened up about her high-profile battle to regain custody of her children, 1-year-old son Amen’Ra and 10-day-old daughter Ast. After both children were removed from her custody within the past six months and placed in the care of Child Protective Services, Mercado and Tyron Deener, her partner and the father of the children, sat down for a news conference on Tuesday, which you can watch here, delivering an emotional plea to regain custody.
During the news conference, Mercado and Deener denied allegations that they had mistreated their children. Amen’Ra was placed in the custody of Child Protective Services in mid-March after the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office received a tip about a child who was “suffering from severe malnutrition,” Randy Warren, a spokesperson for the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office, told PEOPLE. Ast was removed from the couple’s custody on Wednesday. However, both Mercado and Deener said they “have no criminal background” and “no history with DCF.” They said they “have done nothing wrong” and they “should have never been criminalized for getting assistance for something.” Deener said their lives revolve “around health, balance and doing what we can to guide our children” and “nothing that we do is detrimental to our babies.”
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In the clip, a heartbroken Mercado said she was “missing out on so many precious moments” with her children. As a “first-time mom,” she said she has been “deprived of holding my babies, and feeding my babies. I didn’t get to see Ra say mama for the first time. I didn’t get to see my babies meet for the first time. I didn’t get to see that and I can’t go back and redo that moment. I will never be able to go back and redo that moment.”
“I’m just missing out on so many precious moments — this is such a precious time. I feel my daughter. I feel when she’s hungry and know when she’s crying. And I can’t do anything. She’s not here with me,” she continued. “I’m supposed to be loving my babies. I’ve been deprived of that and I don’t know how to articulate it. It hurts so bad.”
Both Amen’Ra and Ast remain in state protection. Captain Dennis E. Romano Jr. of the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office’s Child Protection Investigations Division said in a statement to PEOPLE that “Child Protective Services does not shelter children from families with the intent to keep them separated for long… The last thing anyone in this business wants to do is shelter children from their parents, but sometimes it is the only direction we are forced to take.” The case has since been taken up by civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who criticized the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office for “publicly dehumanizing” a Black family with their actions during the Tuesday news conference. Mercado has also created a GoFundMe to help pay for legal costs. The page has raised more than $418,000.
