Friend says missing toddler’s mom made child scream

Zinah Jennings, the mother of a Columbia toddler last seen Nov. 29, squeezed the little boy’s hand until he screamed with pain the last time a longtime friend saw them in late November, the friend said Tuesday.

“She wanted Amir to say ma-ma, and when he wouldn’t, he started to scream. I looked down and she was squeezing his hand,” said friend Jessica Thomas, 24, a criminal justice student at Columbia’s Benedict College.

Thomas, who went to Dreher High School with Jennings, said Tuesday that Zinah in recent months had seemed to undergo a personality change and last autumn threw Thomas’ 2-year-old nephew on the floor, causing him to cry.

“She just said, ‘He was bothering me,’” said Thomas, who has also told her story to Columbia police officers investigating the disappearance of Amir Jennings, who was 18 months old when he went missing.

Jennings, 22 and an unemployed single mother, remains jailed after being charged Dec. 29 with unlawful conduct toward a child for refusing to tell authorities the whereabouts of her son. Meanwhile, Columbia police are running forensic tests on what appear to be bloody clothes and blankets found recently in Jennings’ car and a shovel found in her back yard.

City police investigating Amir’s disappearance are familiar with accounts of seemingly abusive behavior by Zinah Jennings, Columbia Police Chief Randy Scott said Tuesday.

“Family members do tell us that they began to see a change in behavior after Amir was born,” said Scott. “Up to then, she was a college student, a good adult.”

However, Scott would not comment on specifics of what police are learning.

Jennings, who initially talked with police and gave them conflicting, unfounded accounts of where her son might be, now is silent, Scott said.

“She has a lawyer and is refusing to talk to us now,” Scott said. “She’s not cooperating in any way, shape or form. She is a mother who is continuing not to assist law enforcement with her child’s safe return.”

Chief 5th Circuit Public Defender Doug Strickler confirmed late Tuesday his department is representing Jennings and declined further comment.

The charge against Jennings, whose bond was set at $150,000, stems from a series of “false and inconsistent” statements made to police concerning Amir’s whereabouts.

Jennings “has purposely lied to law enforcement several times regarding the whereabouts of Amir,” the warrant in her case says. On Dec. 24, she told one officer the child was in Atlanta with her aunt. On Dec. 28, she told another officer the child was at the residence of “Ernest Robinson.”

However, the warrant said, Robinson does not exist and Amir was not in Atlanta.

Scott on Tuesday announced a $10,000 reward for information leading to Amir’s whereabouts. He encouraged anyone with any information at all to come forward.

“It might be a piece of the puzzle,” Scott said. “I am holding out hope Amir will be found safe.”

According to search warrants in the case, police have:

• Searched the two-story blue frame house at 2309 Lady St. in the Waverly neighborhood, where Jennings lived with her mother and Amir. The warrant said police were looking for “any human remains” and anything that “could be used to dispose of such remains.” A cadaver dog was used. Police seized a shovel.

•  Searched a car used by Zinah Jennings and found “stains consistent with bloodstains” on clothing and blankets. Police took a swab of fluid or tissue from her for DNA identification purposes. No results have been announced.

• Gotten Zinah Jennings’s library and computer-use records from the Richland County Public Library at 1431 Assembly St. Police said they were acting on a tip that she frequented the library. Police also obtained copies of library surveillance videos.

• Received 28 pages of medical records from Palmetto Health Richland hospital concerning Jennings’ treatment Dec. 24 after a Columbia car crash. Until then, Jennings had been reported missing along with her child. Officers also sought statements from nurses and doctors who talked to Jennings during her treatment. When officers questioned her, she gave the first of “numerous false statements” to police and family, a warrant said.

Jennings also told the hospital’s staff she did not have a child, according to a warrant.

Jocelyn Jennings Nelson, Zinah’s mother, could not be reached for comment Tuesday evening. Jocelyn Jennings is cooperating with police, as is the biological father of Amir, Scott said.