The death of a 27-day-old baby girl after a fall from a neonatal intensive care unit crib in Ohio has turned a family’s worst nightmare into a public reckoning over hospital safety. Her father, Peyton, now says a staff member’s mistake cost his daughter her life and is taking that claim into court, arguing that what happened in a room built for fragile newborns should never have been possible.
The case centers on Ellieana Peyton, a tiny patient whose short life was already complicated by a serious heart condition before the fall that fractured her skull and, according to her family, changed everything. As the lawsuit moves forward, it is forcing hard questions about how a modern NICU is run, how families are told about medical errors, and what accountability looks like when the patient is too young to speak for herself.
From NICU Hope to Sudden Horror
Ellieana Peyton arrived in the world with more on her medical chart than most adults, and she was quickly admitted to the Nationwide Children Hospital ICU because of a heart condition that made every day feel precarious. Her father, a Muskingum County father, has said he trusted that the Columbus facility, widely known for pediatric care, would be the safest place for his daughter. Instead, he now alleges that the very environment meant to protect her exposed her to a preventable fall that her tiny body could not survive.
According to the complaint, Ellieana was nearing a turning point and was slated to leave the ICU at Nationwide Children when everything unraveled. The family says they had stepped away briefly, only to receive a call that their newborn had fallen from her crib in the NICU, a detail that echoes what relative Stella Dunlap later described publicly as being told that “their baby had been dropped,” a moment she shared on the family’s GoFundMe page.
The Fall, the Injuries, and a Coroner’s Ruling
In the lawsuit, Peyton alleges that a patient care assistant left one rail down on Ellieana’s crib, creating the opening that allowed the 27-day-old to fall to the floor of the Ohio NICU. A detailed account shared by Taryn Lynne on social media, citing the complaint, describes how “on the evening” of the fall, the assistant allegedly walked away from the crib with the side still down, a claim that has been repeated in a widely shared post. The family says that gap in basic protocol is what sent their daughter headfirst onto the hard surface below.
Medical records cited in the civil complaint say a brain scan later showed that the newborn’s skull was fractured and that a physical exam documented swelling and bruising where her head hit, injuries that were laid out in detail in a report on the head trauma. A coroner’s report from the Franklin County Forensic Science Center, shared with reporters, later concluded that Ellieana died on March 31 of “congenital heart disease complicated by the head injury,” a finding that framed the fall as a critical factor in a child who was already medically fragile, according to the coroner’s summary.
A Wrongful Death Lawsuit and a Father’s Push for Accountability
Earlier this year, Peyton filed a wrongful death lawsuit in Franklin County Common, accusing the hospital and staff of medical negligence and corporate negligence tied to the fall. The complaint, which has been described in multiple reports, argues that Nationwide Children’s Hospital for Ellieana Peyton failed to maintain a safe environment, properly train staff, and enforce basic crib safety rules, and that those alleged failures directly led to the baby’s fatal injuries. Peyton is seeking damages and a formal acknowledgment that what happened to his daughter was not just a tragic twist of fate.
The legal filing builds on earlier coverage that identified him as a Muskingum County father suing Nationwide Children Hospital for the death of his infant daughter. In that account, the lawsuit describes how Ellieana Peyton’s already serious heart condition was “complicated by the head injury” she suffered in the fall, a line that ties the medical facts back to the legal argument that the hospital’s alleged lapse turned a survivable condition into a fatal one. For Peyton, the courtroom is now the place where he hopes to force a full accounting of every decision made in that NICU room.
Hospital Response, Official Findings, and a Clash Over Blame
Nationwide Children has not publicly walked through every detail of the incident, but the hospital has been at the center of multiple official reviews since Ellieana’s death. A report from the Franklin County Corner, discussed in a local broadcast, said an infant died at Nationwide Children Hospital and that the death was due to a fall from a crib, a conclusion that lined up with what the family had already shared. Another local station reported that the Newborn death at the Ohio hospital was ruled accidental after the fall, a finding that complicates Peyton’s argument that negligence, not accident, is the core story.
That tension between “accidental” and “avoidable” is now at the heart of the public debate. Coverage from COLUMBUS, Ohio noted that the hospital declined to comment on the specifics, citing privacy and legal constraints, even as the story spread nationally. For families watching from afar, the official label of “accidental” from Franklin County Corner may sound like closure, but for Peyton it appears to be just one more finding to challenge as he presses his case that a staff member’s actions, and the systems around them, are what really need to be on trial.
Broader Questions About NICU Safety and Trust
Ellieana’s story is not unfolding in a vacuum. Around the same time, another report from Kansas City Star described a separate case in Ohio in which a Nurse’s accident allegedly dragged a baby girl from a hospital crib, raising similar alarms about how quickly a routine task can turn catastrophic when safety steps slip. In Ellieana’s case, relatives like Stella Dunlap have used crowdfunding pages to spell out their version of events, including the moment they say they learned that “their baby had been dropped,” a phrase that appears again in coverage of the NICU fall. Together, these accounts have parents across the country rethinking what “safe” really means inside intensive care units.
For Peyton, the legal fight is about more than one hospital or one assistant. His complaint argues that Nationwide Children Hospital ICU staff should have been trained and supervised in a way that made leaving a rail down unthinkable, a point echoed in summaries that say Ellieana Peyton was admitted to the Nationwide Children Hospital ICU shortly after birth because of her heart condition and needed constant protection. As the case unfolds, it is also shining a light on the broader ecosystem around the hospital, from the Columbus community that surrounds the campus to the parents who now walk into NICUs everywhere with a little more hesitation than before.
More from Decluttering Mom: