‘Police officers failed me’: Mother grieves loss of son found dead in Las Vegas pool

On a summer night in June, TayShaun Todd headed to what his mother said was the second party he attended in his adult life. The next day, the 20-year-old man was found dead in a pool where the party took place.

The Metropolitan Police Department found Todd dead in a swimming pool at 12:31 p.m. June 18 at a home in the 2600 block of Palma Vista Avenue. In a statement that day, police called the death a “possible drowning.”

But that was not the first time Metro had visited the residence. Police responded to a call for service at the same address at 8:31 p.m. the night prior because of a large party there, according to a Metro report. At 11:31 p.m., Metro received a call from Todd’s mother, Christina Todd-Dunn, stating that her son was missing and was last seen at the party, the report said.

But Todd-Dunn said it took several calls filled with “begging” and “pleading” before officers came to the home around 2 a.m. They did not find her son then — which she believes is due to the department not taking her concerns seriously.

By the time officers found Todd, the Clark County coroner’s office said he had been in the pool for at least 12 hours, according to Todd-Dunn. The coroner said Monday that the cause and manner of Todd’s death were pending.

“The part that is so upsetting to me is, if the police would have got there and came when I asked them to, they could have gotten him out. He could still be alive right now,” Todd-Dunn said.

Metro did not respond to requests for comment on Sunday or Monday.

‘Police officers failed me’

The horror for Todd-Dunn started when her younger son woke her around 11 p.m. on June 17 to tell her that Todd was missing. A friend had called to say that the party was shut down by police, but that he could not find Todd and did not think that he had made it out of the party.

Todd-Dunn said she knew something was up the moment she heard her son was missing. She said her son was a great kid who spent all of his time playing basketball, going to school and going to work.

What’s more: His friend had his keys, wallet and phone, she said.

Todd-Dunn said she raced to the house hosting the party and called the police on her way, begging them to come help. She got to the house and asked the man there where her son was, but he said he did not know and that everyone who had been at the party had left. He then asked her to leave, Todd-Dunn said.

Hours later, she said, Metro did show up. But instead of doing a thorough search for her son, she said the officer asked questions about where her son was — Could he be drinking? Doing drugs? With a girl? But Todd-Dunn knew her son did not do drugs, and this wasn’t normal.

“Do you really think I’d be out here in my pajamas looking for him if I thought that was the norm?” Todd-Dunn said in an interview. “I could have rolled back over and went to sleep, like, ‘Oh, he’ll turn up.’ But I knew something had to be wrong, because that’s not him.”

Todd-Dunn said she did everything she could to figure out what happened. Her friends canvassed the neighborhoods and surrounding businesses, and she called the hospital and went to the police station in person. When she got back to the house later on June 18, she saw yellow tape, ambulances and police. That’s when she discovered that they found a man, later identified as her son, dead in the pool.

“I feel like the police officers failed me. They failed my son. Y’all should have done a full search if it was a pool party and I’m saying he didn’t come up out of here. Y’all should have turned the house upside down to find him,” Todd-Dunn said.

Caller reports body

A 911 caller told police at 12:29 p.m. on June 18 he found a body in his pool, and believed it was the person officers were looking for the night prior, according to audio obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

“Yesterday, they were — the police came here,” the caller said. “They were looking for this kid. You know, they searched my backyard. We didn’t find him. And then this morning, we’re going into the pool, and I see, I see some guy just at the bottom of my pool.”

Metro’s report said officers had checked the residence the night prior but did not see Todd.

‘Everybody is taking it extremely hard’

In the days since her son’s death, Todd-Dunn has barely been able to sleep or eat.

“Everybody is taking it extremely hard,” she said. “If they were sad, he could tell them a joke and cheer them up. He was always the silly one. He liked to have a good time, liked for everybody to be happy.”

Todd studied sports management at the College of Southern Nevada. He was set to start as a teaching assistant in August at a Henderson school, Pinecrest Academy of Nevada, which he had attended.

His mother said it’s also been hard for her to see her two other sons go through the pain of losing their older brother.

“They feel like they lost their best friend, their hero,” Todd-Dunn said.

Contact Katie Futterman at kfutterman@reviewjournal.com. Follow @ktfutts on X.

Review-Journal staff writer Casey Harrison contributed to this report.