The dance mom involved in an apparent murder-suicide with her 11-year-old daughter during a cheer competition trip to Las Vegas had reportedly been receiving “mean” text messages from other parents on the team, The New York Post has learned.
According to her own mother, 38-year-old Tawnia McGeehan had ongoing issues with “one or two” other women whose daughters were also members of the Utah Xtreme Cheer (UXC) team, where her daughter, Addi Smith, cheered.
“There’s one or two ladies that she never got along with, and it got really bad a month ago,” Connie McGeehan ( McGeehan’s Mom), 61, told The Post.
“In the last comp they had, another girl got dropped and some of the moms were saying it was because of Addi. They were texting Tawnia mean stuff and blaming Addi.
“Cheer was her and Addi’s life. I think something happened the day before [they died] that made her spiral.”
A second source told The Post that Tawnia had recently been involved in a heated confrontation with another cheer mom in a team waiting room. Her mother said Tawnia had struggled with depression for much of her life but seemed to be improving, especially after resolving a nine-year custody battle with her ex-husband, Brad Smith, in 2024.
Utah Xtreme Cheer (UXC) owner Kory Uyetake acknowledged there had been “comments back and forth” between Tawnia and a few other parents but said everything appeared normal when the team traveled from Utah to Nevada for the competition. Addi, who was in her first season, “loved” being on the team and was always eager to practice, he said, calling her a “beautiful girl” who “didn’t deserve this.”
Tawnia and Addi were found dead Sunday at the Rio hotel and casino after they failed to show up for the competition. Concerned family members requested a welfare check, and authorities discovered their bodies along with a note.
Family members said the pair had been living with Tawnia’s mother, Connie, at her Salt Lake City home for some time.
Police and hotel security first went to the mother and daughter’s room around 10:45 a.m. Sunday after receiving a request for a welfare check.
Officers knocked several times but left when there was no response, authorities said. After additional requests to check on them, hotel security returned to the room and made the tragic discovery at approximately 2:30 p.m.
Concern also grew from Addi’s stepmother, McKennly Smith, who shared a missing persons poster along with a message that read: “My daughter Addi and her mom [are] missing please share post and call or text with any information thank you!”
Connie told The Post that investigators have not shared the contents of the note found in the hotel room.
“We had no idea [Tawnia] was thinking about something like this,” she said to the New York Post, adding that she believed her daughter had been doing better. “She’d even been having some of the cheer moms over and making things with the kids.”
Connie said she did not know Tawnia owned a gun or that she had brought one across state lines. She later learned that Tawnia had purchased the firearm more than a year ago.
