A Birmingham woman has pleaded guilty in the 2020 blunt force trauma death of her boyfriend’s toddler daughter.

Tykeila Johnson, 38, was initially charged with capital murder in the killing of 18-month-old Kar’Mynn Brachelle Gaines. She was arrested five months after the child’s death.

Johnson pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of reckless manslaughter, according to court records.

As part of the plea agreement, Johnson will be sentenced to 10 years in prison with 18 months to actually serve, followed by three years of probation.

She will be formally sentenced before Jefferson County Circuit Judge Alaric May in October.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Amanda Wineman.

Johnson was represented by attorneys John Lentine and Chris Daniel.

Kar’Mynn was injured Nov. 16, 2020, and then taken off life support Dec. 10, 2020.

The Jefferson County Coroner’s Office said Kar’Mynn suffered blunt force trauma to the head.

The injury happened at a private residence in the 600 block of Carraway Boulevard while in Johnson’s care, authorities and family members said.

The girl’s father, Kameron Gaines, had taken Kar’Mynn to the doctor earlier in the day for her regular checkup. Later that night, he left home for a brief time to go pick up Johnson’s daughter from work.

When he returned, he found Kar’Mynn was having difficulty breathing and the toddler was immediately taken to Children’s of Alabama by Birmingham Fire and Rescue Service.

She immediately underwent surgery to relieve the pressure on her brain.

Her grandmother at the time said surgeons first removed the right side of her skull to relieve the pressure and, when that didn’t work, they removed more skull from the left side. The third surgery took place because infection was setting in.

Kar’Mynn never regained consciousness throughout her hospital stay. Her family, including grandmother, mother and father, stayed by her side as much as they could.

Kar’Mynn was taken off life support about 2 p.m. that Thursday and survived about four hours before she took her last breath 5:48 p.m.

“I let her mom and dad hold her,’’ Melanie Gaines, Kar’Mynn’s paternal grandmother, said in a previous interview. “They held her until she took her last breath. That’s the only image he (her father) has of her now.”

Kameron Gaines described his only daughter as full of life. “She was the bossiest, sassiest 1-year-old there was,’’ Kameron Gaines said in a previous interview with AL.com. “She told me what to do. She was something else.”

“My baby deserved the world, but she didn’t deserve this,’’ he said. “She’s an angel now.”

Johnson’s attorneys say they are relieved she is no longer facing either the death penalty or life in prison without parole.

“From the inception of the case Ms. Johnson has always maintained that she never intended to cause the death of the child,” Lentine said. “It was Ms. Johnson who helped bring the child into her home in the first place.”

“She has children of her own and prior to this allegation had never been accused of intending to harm any child and she had no criminal record,” he said.

Lentine said there were issues with the preservation of evidence, specifically the child’s body which, following the autopsy, was released back to the father of the child who cremated the body.

“There had been a motion filed by the defense to preserve evidence and this action eliminated the defense’s ability to conduct an independent autopsy,” Lentine said. “However, in the end, the state made an offer taking the capital murder charge off the table and made an offer reflective of the actual facts and circumstances surrounding the entirety of the case.”