SIMPSONVILLE, S.C. (WJW) — The Food Network has pulled the 2020 season of “Worst Cooks in America” after one of the contestants was arrested in the murder of a 3-year-old girl.
Ariel Robinson, 29, was the winner of Season 20.
WYFF reports Robinson and her husband, Jerry, 34, were both arrested in the death of their adopted daughter, Victoria Smith, 3. They were charged on Jan. 19 with homicide by child abuse, according to Greenville County jail records.
Arrest warrants allege the couple inflicted “a series of blunt force injuries” to the child, who died at the hospital.
WYFF reports they interviewed Ariel Robinson in August 2020 after she won the Food Network contest. She said the $25,000 prize would be used to help her and her husband, who had recently adopted three children.
“I just know that the Lord had his hands on me and he had a purpose for me to go on there,” she told the TV news station at the time. “He knew we were going through this adoption, we really could use the money and he just let everything work out for our good.”
Robinson is a former middle school teacher who also performed comedy, WYFF reports.
