Jarmecca “Nikki” Whitehead was 18 years old when she became pregnant. Nikki and later her identical twin girls, Jasmiyah and Tasmiyah Whitehead, were raised by Nikki’s grandmother Della Frazier. When Nikki left Clarkstown, Georgia to live with her boyfriend in the affluent gated community of Conyers, Georgia, the twins stayed with their great-grandmother. When the girls were 13, Nikki wanted to the girls to live with her and her boyfriend in Conyers. A custody battle ensued. The girls rebelled against their mother, with whom they fought physically. The teenage twins were in and out of Juvenile Court for years. In January 2010 when Nikki regained custody of her daughters, the girls protested. The Court ordered a two-week trial. One week into the two-week trial, the girls told police they found their mother stabbed to death in her home.
In January 2014, Tasmiyah pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter. One month later, Jasmiyah pleaded guilty. Both received 30-year sentences. They are serving their time in separate prisons in Georgia (Tasmiyah at Pulaski State Prison in Hawkinsville; Jasmiyah at Arrendale State Prison in Alto). Della Fraizer, now 82, says both girls have earned their GEDs in jail and are eligible for parole in 2017. (They have been in jail since their arrest in 2010.) Dateline NBC will re-air its investigative report on the Whitehead family on Sunday, April 10 at 10pm.
