After a psychiatric evaluation, a judge from Miami-Dade declared competent to stand trial Meliza Campos Sánchez, the 26-year-old Cuban woman accused of pouring hot wax on one of her daughter's hands and intentionally setting fire to the kitchen of her home.
The judicial decision comes after a psychiatric evaluation ordered by Judge Christine Hernandez, who instructed two Spanish-speaking doctors to determine whether the accused was capable of understanding the legal proceedings and cooperating with her defense, reported Telemundo 51.
Only after passing that evaluation can the trial proceed in Florida's judicial system, and now their next hearing is scheduled for six weeks from now, the news channel reported.
The case became public in August 2026 following videos that Campos Sánchez had posted on her Instagram account, where she presented herself as the "Realtor without filters" and amassed tens of thousands of followers.
In one of those videos, she is seen pouring melted wax first onto her own leg and then onto the hands of her three-year-old daughter, while telling her, “The fears you’re feeling today will be your strength tomorrow.” The girl responds, “That burns.”
The central incident occurred on August 16 in a home in southwest Miami-Dade, where the accused used a lighter to set fire to clothing soaked in flammable liquid while the minors were inside the house.
It was the six-year-old girl who managed to extinguish the flames with a container of water.
Campos Sánchez was arrested the next day and initially taken to a hospital under Florida's Baker Act—which allows for emergency involuntary hospitalization for up to 72 hours—before being transferred to the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.
He faces charges of first-degree arson, child abuse, and two counts of child neglect. A judge has ordered his detention without bail.
Her husband, Yusniel Cue, from whom she had been separated for about a week, stated that he had called the police three times before the incident to alert them about his wife's deteriorating mental state, receiving no effective response.
"They told me that until there was a crime, they couldn't take her, they couldn't do anything," he stated in an interview with Univision. It was he who prompted the police intervention after receiving the video from friends and calling the Sheriff's Office.
The family of the accused insists that she was going through a mental health crisis and had stopped taking her medication. Her cousin Aliuska Rodríguez stated: «There are many women testifying that she is a good woman, that she is a very good mother, and that in her right mind, she would not have done this».
The case also took on a migratory dimension: the Department of Homeland Security reported that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) issued a detainment order against Campos under the label "Miami Menace," with the intent to deport her once the criminal proceedings concluded.
According to the authorities, he illegally entered the United States through Florida in May 2022. The two girls remain in the custody of their father.
After the mental competency hearing, the next hearing is scheduled to take place in approximately six weeks.
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