Mother vows to find justice for her daughter's murder

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WSMV/Gray News) – When 29-year-old April Holt’s death was ruled a suicide, her mother knew something was wrong.

April embodied a positive attitude that she shared in the videos she created and posted on TikTok, which were viewed by 200,000 followers.

“I still watch her almost every day because I feel like I can actually feel her,” said Holt’s mother, Jamie Dickerson.

Dickerson spoke to WSMV Monday in a classroom at Believers Faith Fellowship in Christiana. It was full of decorations and items that April had put there over the years of teaching middle school students.

Dickerson was supposed to meet her daughter there more than a year ago.

Police said April Holt was found with a plastic bag taped tightly around her neck and died at the hospital. Her death was initially ruled a suicide.(WSMV)

“We wanted to watch the Barbie movie,” she explained. “She said, ‘Donovan has to work, I can’t go to the movies, but we’ll meet at church tomorrow in the blast classroom.'”

Dickerson never had the chance to respond to April. She and her husband Donovan Holt had a difficult relationship and were on the verge of divorce. Dickerson received a call the next day.

“The phone rang and it was Donovan and he was upset – kind of panicking,” she said as she recalled the events of 2023. “He said, ‘We noticed April wasn’t breathing, and she is in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.'”

Metro Nashville police said April was found with a plastic bag taped tightly to her neck. She died in hospital. In 2023 she left behind a 12-year-old daughter and an eight-year-old son.

Her death was ruled a suicide, but Dickerson knew that was far from the truth.

“They closed April’s case,” she said. “DA and everyone agreed to close it. I stood up, walked out of the room and said, ‘I’m not done yet, I’m going to continue the investigation.'”

Dickerson spent hours every day trying to figure out who killed April. She filed a complaint, ultimately leading Metro Nashville police to reinvestigate the case. The department prepared a 47-page report.

According to the report, investigators said Donovan Holt’s fingerprints were “found on two occasions” on the roll of tape.

Dickerson showed Donovan this information.

“I said, ‘You can tell me the truth, or I’ll meet with the cold case team next Thursday and reopen this,'” she told him.

Metro Nashville police said weeks ago that Donovan confessed to strangling April, something Dickerson had suspected from the start.

“I’m not shocked,” she said. “I’ve been doing this for a year and I know what happened. I already knew.”

April is now buried just minutes from her church. While Dickerson never had the opportunity to respond to her daughter over a year ago, she said her TikTok videos are words from the grave.

“I still watch her videos and think, ‘Oh, I needed that one day,'” Dickerson said.

In the last year, Dickerson wrote a book about grief and plans to open a grief community center for Rutherford and Bedford counties.

Donovan was charged with involuntary manslaughter, tampering with evidence and false reporting. Dickerson says she wants that charge expanded to first-degree murder and child endangerment added to the charge.

Mother vows to find justice for her daughter’s murder

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