05-26-2011, 04:29 AM
Gary, Indiana
Despite warnings, authorities didn't prevent caged boy's death
'We failed him,' retired child-welfare official says
Lori Wingard had a bad feeling about what was going on in the mobile home across the street, bad enough that she said she called authorities not once, but twice.
As many as 10 children lived with Riley Choate and his wife, Kimberly Kubina, in the Gary trailer park, and teens and even toddlers seemed to come and go at all hours, even on school days.
And there was one boy Wingard never saw: Christian Choate, a 12-year-old the Choates said needed to be "guarded" 24 hours a day. Wingard's husband went inside once in the summer of 2008 to fix a fuse box, and saw the scrawny child cower as Riley Choate bellowed threats at him.
"(Christian) was just terrified. He hid in a corner like they had him tied there," she recalled.
Wingard said she called the Indiana Department of Child Services that day, and again a few weeks later. After both calls, she saw someone, she assumes a caseworker for the state, visit the Choates' trailer and talk to Kubina on the front porch.
Earlier this month Kubina and Choate were charged with murder in Christian's 2009 death following years of alleged abuse that included locking him in a dog cage for most of the last two years of his life, according to authorities. Reading the news more than three years after she first called authorities, Wingard joined a shocked public in wondering: How could this happen?
A Tribune review of court records and interviews with neighbors, relatives and investigators shows the Choates had a long history of involvement with child welfare authorities — but no one intervened in time to prevent Christian's death.
Child welfare authorities visited the family multiple times before 2009 and at least once temporarily placed some of the children in foster care, according to police investigators and relatives.
"We failed. We failed him," said Lavetta Sparks-Wade, who was head of the Lake County's Child Protective Services investigators until she retired in 2009.
<snipped>
Riley Choate won custody of Christian and an older sister, Christina, in 2005 after a yearlong court fight with the children's biological mother, Aimee Estrada, recalled Choate's attorney in the custody fight, George Galanos. A court-appointed guardian awarded Choate custody after interviews with both parents, the children and teachers, Galanos said.
"It was the happiest day of Riley's life. I find it hard to square what we're hearing today with what I know about Riley," Galanos said.
But by 2007, prosecutors say, Christian had been withdrawn from public school, endured daily beatings and was mostly confined to the cage, sometimes wearing nothing but a diaper, court records show. Investigators learned about Christian's death this month.
A day or two before Christian died in April 2009, Christina said, Christian refused to eat, and Riley Choate struck the then-13-year-old "full force several times in the front, side and back of his head before throwing him back in the cage." Two stepsisters said they later saw Christina hit Christian in the head with a metal pole.
Full article here
Graphic timeline here
Despite warnings, authorities didn't prevent caged boy's death
'We failed him,' retired child-welfare official says
Lori Wingard had a bad feeling about what was going on in the mobile home across the street, bad enough that she said she called authorities not once, but twice.
As many as 10 children lived with Riley Choate and his wife, Kimberly Kubina, in the Gary trailer park, and teens and even toddlers seemed to come and go at all hours, even on school days.
And there was one boy Wingard never saw: Christian Choate, a 12-year-old the Choates said needed to be "guarded" 24 hours a day. Wingard's husband went inside once in the summer of 2008 to fix a fuse box, and saw the scrawny child cower as Riley Choate bellowed threats at him.
"(Christian) was just terrified. He hid in a corner like they had him tied there," she recalled.
Wingard said she called the Indiana Department of Child Services that day, and again a few weeks later. After both calls, she saw someone, she assumes a caseworker for the state, visit the Choates' trailer and talk to Kubina on the front porch.
Earlier this month Kubina and Choate were charged with murder in Christian's 2009 death following years of alleged abuse that included locking him in a dog cage for most of the last two years of his life, according to authorities. Reading the news more than three years after she first called authorities, Wingard joined a shocked public in wondering: How could this happen?
A Tribune review of court records and interviews with neighbors, relatives and investigators shows the Choates had a long history of involvement with child welfare authorities — but no one intervened in time to prevent Christian's death.
Child welfare authorities visited the family multiple times before 2009 and at least once temporarily placed some of the children in foster care, according to police investigators and relatives.
"We failed. We failed him," said Lavetta Sparks-Wade, who was head of the Lake County's Child Protective Services investigators until she retired in 2009.
<snipped>
Riley Choate won custody of Christian and an older sister, Christina, in 2005 after a yearlong court fight with the children's biological mother, Aimee Estrada, recalled Choate's attorney in the custody fight, George Galanos. A court-appointed guardian awarded Choate custody after interviews with both parents, the children and teachers, Galanos said.
"It was the happiest day of Riley's life. I find it hard to square what we're hearing today with what I know about Riley," Galanos said.
But by 2007, prosecutors say, Christian had been withdrawn from public school, endured daily beatings and was mostly confined to the cage, sometimes wearing nothing but a diaper, court records show. Investigators learned about Christian's death this month.
A day or two before Christian died in April 2009, Christina said, Christian refused to eat, and Riley Choate struck the then-13-year-old "full force several times in the front, side and back of his head before throwing him back in the cage." Two stepsisters said they later saw Christina hit Christian in the head with a metal pole.
Full article here
Graphic timeline here