The Utah dance mom who allegedly killed herself and her 11-year-old daughter was involved in a brutal text war with cheer squad mothers just before they were found dead, according to a heartbroken relative.
Tawnia McGeehan, 38, and her daughter, Addi Smith, were discovered inside a room at the Rio Hotel & Casino on Sunday around 2.30pm after an apparent murder-suicide.
It remains unclear why Tawnia, who endured a bitter custody battle with her ex-husband, allegedly took her and her child's life, but according to her mother, Connie McGeehan, there was a rift between her daughter and other cheer moms.
Connie said other mothers with the Utah Xtreme Cheer (UXC) team were sending her daughter 'mean' messages and placing blame on Addi after another girl withdrew from a recent competition.
'There's one or two ladies that she never got along with and it got really bad a month ago,' Connie told the New York Post.
'In the last comp they had, another girl got dropped and some of the moms were saying it was because of Addi,' Connie said. 'They were texting [Tawnia] mean stuff and blaming Addi.'
The devastated 61-year-old mother and grandmother said she is now convinced something transpired in the mom group that made Tawnia 'spiral.'
'Cheer was her and Addi's life,' Connie said through tears.
Tawnia McGeehan and her daughter, Addi Smith, were found fatally shot inside their Las Vegas hotel room on Sunday. They were in town from Utah for a cheer competition.
Addi's mother was involved in a bitter text exchange with other cheer moms just before they were found dead, according to the girl's grandmother, Connie McGeehan.
Kory Uyetake, the owner of the UXC team, revealed that he also heard there had been 'comments back and forth' between Tawnia and other moms.
Still, he said that nothing seemed out of the ordinary on Saturday when the team traveled to Nevada for the competition.
Uyetake told The Post that Addi, who was in her first season on the team, 'was the first [to practice] every time.'
'She was a beautiful girl and she didn't deserve this,' he added.
Another source close to the cheer team also revealed there was a recent 'confrontation' between Tawnia and another dance mom while they were in the team waiting room, per the outlet.
Connie said her daughter and granddaughter were living in her seven-bedroom Salt Lake City home with her and other relatives for a while.
'Addi loved her gymnastics, she loved her friends, she always seemed happy no matter what,' she said.
According to Connie, Tawnia appeared to be in good spirits leading up to the weekend competition.
She said she had made gifts for the team, bought new clothes for the trip, and even posted joyous pictures of 'Addi doing backflips' in their hotel room at 5am on Sunday - just hours before they were found dead.
Tawnia and Addi's bodies were discovered inside their Las Vegas hotel room after they traveled to Sin City for a dance competition that they never showed up for.
Police were notified of the mother and daughter missing after receiving a welfare check call on Sunday morning inside the resort.
After arriving at the scene, they knocked on the door and called out to the room for more than 15 minutes before leaving.
Security inside the hotel then went up to the room in the early afternoon after receiving calls from their relatives.
They too knocked on the door and, after not hearing any response, decided to enter, finding the two bodies inside.
Despite seeing the image of them in happier times just before Addi and Tawnia were discovered, Connie said another picture of the pair struck her as odd.
'They just looked like they were happy but then there was one pic of Addi and Tawnia together and I thought something doesn't look right. The look was off, something had happened. Something was off,' the grandmother told The Post.
She said no one in the family knew Tawnia owned a gun or carried it on her.
Connie said no one in the family knew Tawnia owned a gun or carried it on her.
Kory Uyetake, the owner of the UXC team, said he also heard that there had been 'comments back and forth' between Tawnia and other moms. He described Addi as a 'beautiful girl' who 'didn't deserve this'
[We've since learned] she bought it over a year ago,' Connie stated.
After news of their tragic deaths came out, the Daily Mail uncovered that Tawnia was involved in a complex custody battle with her ex-husband and Addi's father, Bradley Smith.
The pair had such a tumultuous relationship that they were ordered to park five spots apart from each other during custody handovers for their daughter.
The pair divorced in 2015. It is unclear why, but the split was clearly acrimonious.
The former couple also spent nine years fighting for custody of Addi, leading to a list of rules to try to keep them apart as much as possible.
In the most recent ruling, advising the parents to park spaces apart from each other, Addi was ordered to walk between the vehicles herself.
When school was not in session, her parents were ordered to complete the handover outside the Herriman Police Department in Utah at 9am every Monday.
Both parents were warned in the custody ruling not to film the custody handovers and were banned from approaching one another at Addi's school events.
After news of their tragic deaths came out, the Daily Mail uncovered that Tawnia was involved in a complex custody battle with her ex-husband and Addi's father, Bradley Smith (pictured with Addi)
The court ordered the two to 'encourage and accept' a positive relationship between Addi and the opposing parent and to keep their 'personal conflicts' away from the youngster.
They also had to make Addi available for FaceTime on Tuesday and Friday nights at 6pm. The parents were each given a 15 minute window to make the call or risk forfeiting it for the day.
The parents were forbidden from criticizing each other in front of Addi and banned from letting their relatives do the same in front of their daughter.
The investigation into Tawnia and Addi's deaths remains ongoing.
The Daily Mail contacted the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) for comment.