I am so tired of hearing these sick stories of people that are abusing and neglecting their own children! Here are a couple of recent news stories that have happened in Fort Wayne (names and addresses have been omitted).
Published: March 22, 2011 3:00 a.m.
5 home-alone children found near rat poison
The Journal Gazette
Five young children were left alone for more than two hours inside a south-side home with an open container of rat poison within their reach early Sunday, court documents show.
Fort Wayne police found five children ages 3 to 9 unsupervised Sunday in a home in the ### block of [street name]. Four of the children lived at the home with their mother, [mother], and the fifth was left in her care.
[Mother] was arrested on an initial charges of public intoxication and five counts of neglect of a dependent.
Fort Wayne police responded at 3:20 a.m. on a report of a burglary alarm. A 9-year-old boy living at the home said the alarm was sounding, according to court documents.
The boy told police his mother left two hours earlier and didn’t know where she went, court documents said.
Police said the home was filthy, an iron was found plugged in and set to high heat, an empty .45-caliber handgun case was on the dining room table and an open container of rat poison was found within reach of the children, court documents said.
[Mother], 28, called home about 45 minutes after police arrived and told them she was out back having a cigarette and her alarm went off, court documents said.
When [mother] returned home, police said they could smell alcohol on her breath.
[Mother] was booked into Allen County Lockup at 4:20 a.m. and was later released on $12,500 bail.
She left an iron on, a gun on the table, and an open container of rat poison within reach of the children?! She obviously wanted her children to "accidentally" hurt themselves. I am wondering what it was that pushed her over the edge. What could have been SO bad to do this to children??
Published: April 13, 2011 3:00 a.m.
Mom hurt baby girl, 6-year-old tells court
Rebecca S. Green
With his head about a foot above the wall of the witness chair, [son], who had just turned 6, testified he saw his mother punch his infant sister in the stomach.
The little boy’s testimony came at the end of the first day of testimony Tuesday in the Allen County Superior Court trial of [mother], 26.
Johnson is charged with battery causing death of a child, neglect of a dependent causing death and neglect of a dependent resulting in serious bodily injury.
She was arrested late in the day on Dec. 9, hours after she took the lifeless body of 4-week-old [daughter] from the [name] home in the #### block of [street name] to the home of friends [friend] and [friend], who lived in an apartment on [street], more than three miles away.
Along with the infant, [mother] had her three other small children in the car and told [friend] she thought the baby was dead.
[Daughter] was dead, having suffered a fractured skull and bleeding on her brain. The Allen County Coroner’s Office later ruled her death a homicide.
According to court documents, [daughter] had obvious injuries to her face and chest area, including burns in different stages of healing.
An unidentified substance was found in her stomach during the autopsy and the pathologist believed the burn to the chest appeared to have come at a different time as the facial burn.
[Mother]’s friend [friend] wiped tears from her eyes as she described how [mother] did not want [daughter], the youngest of her four children, either before the baby’s death or afterward.
[Friend] said [mother] seemed to have an “attitude” about how she felt about the baby, telling everyone she only had three children though she obviously had four.
“I told her she needed to accept her daughter,” [friend] said. “I don’t think she had any attachment to the baby at all.”
At one point [friend] saw an obvious black eye on [daughter], who also seemed to have bubbly saliva. The baby’s condition was so striking [friend] took a picture of her with a cellphone camera.
The picture clearly shows a black and blue left eye and the infant’s lips coated with saliva.
“I don’t know, I just had an instinct something might happen,” [friend] said of her decision to take the picture during cross-examination.
When [friend] asked [mother] about [daughter]'s black eye, [mother] told her the other children had hit her.
But when [son] took the stand Tuesday afternoon, he put the blame on his mother.
In his small-child’s voice, he told the court he once saw [mother] twist the baby’s legs and tell [daughter] she was ugly.
[Son] said the baby slept in his room – sometimes in a car seat – and other times sleeping in the bed with [mother].
During cross-examination, [son] said he told [mother] to stop when he saw her punch the infant and “bend her legs.”
Throughout much of the day, [mother] sat calmly, but was obviously saddened, occasionally wiping tears away from her eyes and clutching a tissue in her hand.
The trial is scheduled to continue through Thursday.
How sick is this?! I can not believe that somebody could do such horrible things to a child... an infant... HER OWN daughter!
Sorry for such a downer post today but I just wanted to share these stories. In the second one, the friend admitted that she thought something was up and even took a picture! She might have been able to save that poor baby if she would have went to the police. It's just so sad.
Makes me feel like mother of the year, even though E and I just had a good tiff over her clothes drawers, (which were a disaster, as tends to happen when you change clothes 437 times a day.) I asked her to staighten them up when she yelled "you are SO MEAN to me." Mkay. Whatever kid. Thanks for making our morning seem not so bad :)
ReplyDeleteStories like these always bring tears to my eyes. You are right - they are not mothers.
ReplyDeleteso sad... makes you want to hug your little babes a bit extra today.
ReplyDeleteIt's so sad and just wrong :(
ReplyDelete