Possible Munchausen by proxy victim-investigating the death of Garnett the Great

[cannongal]

Lacey's been arrested

http://www.lohud.com/story/news/investig.../10665173/

His killing, police said, was the final act of a deranged mother who, fueled by attention on social media, medically tortured her child for years.

Lacey Spears pleaded not guilty Tuesday to murder and manslaughter charges in the poisoning death of her five-year-old son, Garnett. She was ordered held without bail at Westchester County jail and is due back in court July 2.

The only words the 26-year-old Alabama native uttered in state Supreme Court in White Plains were "Yes, sir," when Justice Barry Warhit asked if she was Lacey Spears.

Assistant District Attorney Doreen Lloyd presented the government's case, focusing on Spears' time at Nyack Hospital between Jan. 17 and 19 when, Lloyd said, the mother took Garnett into the hospital room's private bathroom and administered the sodium into a tube in the boy's stomach.

"This mother was intentionally feeding her son salt in toxic levels," Lloyd said

Lloyd said prosecutors know from computer records that Spears had searched the Internet to research what the effects of salt would be on her son.

Earlier in the day, Spears' head was bowed as she walked into the back door of Westchester County Police headquarters in Hawthorne, escorted by detectives. Her father, Terry, had his arm around her as she solemnly surrendered. After being processed -- and having her mug shot taken -- Spears left the headquarters silently, not answering reporters' questions before getting into the back of a black, unmarked police car and speeding off.

Acting on a sealed grand jury indictment, law enforcement on Tuesday obtained a warrant to arrest the former Chestnut Ridge resident on a charge of second-degree murder and first-degree manslaughter in the Jan. 23 death of her son, Garnett, at Maria Fareri Children's Hospital in Valhalla, sources said. The murder charge does not accuse her of intentionally killing her son but of acting with depraved indifference toward his life. Spears, 26, who had been staying with her parents in Kentucky, had returned to Westchester and was accompanied by her attorney, David Sachs.

The grand jury's vote concluded a two-week presentation from prosecutors, who based their case on months of investigation in New York, Florida and Alabama -- where Spears and her son lived -- and Tennessee, where they visited Vanderbilt University Hospital.

Capt. Christopher Calabrese, commander of the Westchester County Police Detective Division, said the investigation involved hundreds of interviews and the analysis of tens of thousands of pages of medical records by Westchester and Ramapo detectives and the Westchester County District Attorney's office.

"This is a very sad day for everyone, but it is a day for justice," Calabrese said. "Justice for the betrayal of the intimate trust between a mother and child, justice for a mother's continual abuse and death of her innocent child for her own selfish psychological needs and financial gain; justice for Garnett."

Authorities suspect the single mother, who was a constant presence on social media sharing stories of Garnett's medical crises, may have poisoned the little boy at least twice; once before he experienced seizures that sent him to Nyack Hospital Jan. 17 and again on Jan. 19 at Nyack when his sodium level spiked and he had to be flown to Valhalla.

As Garnett lay dying in the hospital, a Chestnut Ridge neighbor said Spears called and told her to dispose of a bag Spears used to feed the boy through a tube. Police later recovered the bag which had extremely high levels of sodium.

The homicide case may be one of the first involving Munchausen by proxy – a psychiatric disorder in which a parent sickens a child to garner sympathy – in the era of social media.

Spears was living with Garnett in the secluded Fellowship Community when the alleged crime occurred. She faces a maximum of 25 years to life in prison on the murder charge and up to 25 years for manslaughter.

The reaction in Spears' hometown of Decatur, Ala., was swift.

Former nurse Ginger Dabbs-Anderson, who first met Spears and Garnett when the boy was six months old, was grateful for the action, but remorseful that it came too late to save Garnett, who friends called "G."

"I'm happy they got her and I do believe that she's had this problem for years and that he's been suffering at her hands. I really wish we could have prevented this because there were signs.

"Maybe the hospitals should have caught it, maybe her parents should have caught it, maybe those people closest to her should have caught it. She put all over Facebook how wonderful she was. She had us all snowed, she had us all believing she was wonderful. But obviously not."

The former nurse was not surprised to learn that officials suspect Spears may suffer a psychological disorder.

"I don't care if it is a case of Munchausen by Proxy. I think she should get whatever it is anyone else who murders someone gets."

Shawna Lynch, who knew Spears before Garnett was born and initially defended her, said: "I cried. It broke my heart but thank God they're finally going to get justice for G. I just hope she gets what she deserves. I know G's not coming back, but at least we'll have justice for him."

At the Fellowship Community in Chestnut Ridge, people were saddened at the mention of Spears and her son.

"There has to be some way where this isn't true," said one woman who wished not to be named.

Another Fellowship member said she couldn't reconcile the Spears she knew with the one in court on Tuesday.

"I don't see her as a murderer," the woman said. "I think (it was) sickness and I think a lot of things happen to us in our lives that are tragic and make us seek this kind of grief or sympathy that she was looking for. We all do it in different ways. I think it was really wrong of course, and I think it was terrible and all I can do is pray for her."

The charges relate to Garnett's death, but authorities suspect Spears subjected him to past medical abuse, fueled by attention on Facebook, Twitter and blog posts. She presented herself as a doting mother caring for a son who'd been in and out of hospitals his entire life. In a Facebook post in November 2009, she wrote that Garnett was back in the hospital again, his 23^rd hospital visit in his first year.

The investigation began in January, while Garnett was still alive, when doctors at Maria Fareri alerted police that the boy's sodium level had spiked to suspiciously high levels.

Witnesses told The Journal News they saw a doctor at Maria Fareri confront Spears the night of Jan. 19, shortly after she and her son arrived there on an emergency helicopter flight from Nyack. The doctor told her it was "metabolically impossible" for her son's body to produce such extreme levels, and that "something isn't right."

At Maria Fareri, Spears continued to sleep in Garnett's room and had unmonitored access to him in the room's attached bathroom, sources said. There was a similar setup at Nyack Hospital.

The boy was alert and talking on the night of Jan. 20 when friends visited him and Spears in his hospital room. One friend recalled the 5-year-old pleading with her: "Don't leave me."

It wasn't until the following morning, Jan. 21 — after Garnett's condition worsened and he "coded" — that the medical staff notified the state's child-abuse hotline, prompting police and the district attorney's office to get involved. The boy was taken off life support and declared dead Jan. 23.


MUGSHOT^

[Duchess]

Those who kill others, especially in a cold & calculated manner such as she did, deserve to die. There is no defense for what she did, she researched and she planned and now she needs to be put to death.

[ramseycat]

I don't think I'd have trouble executing this one.

[HairOfTheDog]

Lacey's been arrested

http://www.lohud.com/story/news/investig.../10665173/

Good news, cannongal.

Should be an interesting trial if she doesn't end up avoiding a jury of her peers by pleading out with a mental defect defense instead.

Tricky trial for prosecutors though, I imagine. If she sticks to a straight not guilty plea and denies killing her son, a lot of what she posted can be used by her defense attorney to position Lacey as an extremely loving and attentive mother to the jury.

Seems she's not being charged with premeditation (only manslaughter), so doesn't look that prosecutors have enough evidence to prove that she killed Garnett purposely -- looks more like they feel strongly that they can prove she was indifferent about his life and death in the pursuit of her primary goal -- acquiring attention and sympathy for herself. Maybe they'll be able to the up the charges later, as they gather more evidence?

Anyway, I'm glad she's not running around free as a bird any more.

[sally]

How does it remain unknown whether he ever needed a feeding tube in the first place, can't they get the medical records? It's crazy that she got away with making her son sick for so long and the doctors never suspected anything until he was near death.

[HairOfTheDog]

How does it remain unknown whether he ever needed a feeding tube in the first place, can't they get the medical records? It's crazy that she got away with making her son sick for so long and the doctors never suspected anything until he was near death.

I think she moved Garnett around from doctor to doctor to avoid detection.

I caught part of Dr. Drew on Thursday night -- he did a piece on this case and talked about how difficult it is for anyone, including doctors, to grasp a mother slowly killing her child for attention and sympathy. I guess it's pretty rare (unless a lot of parents are getting away with it?).

He also discussed how Lacey had been a caregiver to adults since she was a child and how that may play into her "mental illness". I didn't manage to muster any sympathy for her.

[cannongal]

He also discussed how Lacey had been a caregiver to adults since she was a child and how that may play into her "mental illness". I didn't manage to muster any sympathy for her.

I haven't been able to find any facts about that, but one interview I read was from a family friend who claimed Lacey told this girls mother that she was being sexually molested.

I couldn't find anything further about it (whether a call was made or a case opened).

There was supposed to be a motion hearing on July second, but I haven't had time to go search for it yet.

[HairOfTheDog]

I never saw anything about the July 2^nd motion hearing either, cannongal, though it was mentioned several times in the June case articles. Wonder if it was postponed or sealed?

Dr. Drew and his panel didn't provide the source for his information about Lacey's childhood (not that I heard, anyway).

[cannongal]

I was doing a little digging to see if I could find anything on the July 2 motion hearing, and I cam across a link for the indictment:

Spears indictment

it's a 16 pg long pdf-going to try and read it in between being dragged on water slides and floating on the lazy river.

[cannongal]

Taken From: http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/story.../12763683/

Lacey Spears did not attend a procedural court hearing in her murder trial Wednesday in White Plains, but her sister, Rebecca, was there and heard Lacey's attorney urge the public to keep an open mind in the case.

Rebecca Spears sat in the half-full courtroom gallery, as far as she could get from the half-dozen reporters who were on hand. Lacey Spears' lawyer, David Sachs, said Rebecca Spears was there "to support her sister," whom she had visited in jail earlier in the week.

The murder case against Lacey Spears — accused of poisoning her 5-year-old son with salt through a gastric tube in his stomach — was back in court briefly, as Sachs and prosecutors met in the chambers of acting state Supreme Court Justice Robert Neary to discuss the case's calendar.

Spears, who pleaded not guilty June 17 to second-degree murder and first-degree manslaughter, is being held without bail at Westchester County jail and has been placed on suicide watch in the forensic unit. She was not required to attend Wednesday's session, Sachs said. He has said his client did nothing to harm her son and is a mother grieving a devastating loss.

Wednesday's 10-minute pretrial conference began at 10:15 a.m. After the conference, Neary said the next court date would be Oct. 13.

Sachs has until Sept. 8 to request evidence that the Westchester County district attorney may use in the case, in what is called the case's discovery phase.

Sachs' partner, Stephen Riebling, spoke briefly after the hearing, saying: "Despite the widespread attention the case has received over the past several months, we continue to trust that the people will keep an open mind and not judge Lacey or the facts of the case from what's been reported. The truth of the matter is that Lacey has pleaded not guilty and, with the support of her family, looks forward to her day in court and the opportunity to challenge the allegations and contest the charges. Going forward, the defense of this case will be focused on the relevant facts, not fiction."

Rebecca Spears' face was emotional but she said nothing as she got into the lawyer's dark SUV and sped away.


Rebecca Spears:


Lacey Spears at June 17^th court date:

[HairOfTheDog]

How does it remain unknown whether he ever needed a feeding tube in the first place, can't they get the medical records? It's crazy that she got away with making her son sick for so long and the doctors never suspected anything until he was near death.

The fatality report was just released to the public. It's a frustrating read.

Here's the link to the PDF:
http://data.lohud.com/documents/spears-c...eport.html

Turns out, medical personnel at an Alabama hospital noted that they presumed Lacey Spears' to be emotionally unstable when they treated her son for elevated sodium levels, back when Garnett was only 5 weeks old. They noted that Lacey showed "emotional instability and it was presumed she suffered from Postpartum Depression and Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy" and that Spears "verbalized that she wanted to harm" her son. About a month later, she was referred to "Medical Social Services for interpersonal conflict, stress and dysfunction." There is no record of any follow-up.

When Garnett was 8-months-old, Lacey had moved on to Alabama. She took Garnett to the hospital for bleeding of the eyes, ears, nose and mouth. Medical personnel noted in their files that "something was not right" with the mother, Lacey Spears. However, there is no record of any follow-up or report to child welfare authorities.

Back in Florida in 2011, Garnett would have been 3-years-old, Lacey Spears was investigated twice by child welfare authorities. Once for a report of her slapping Garnett and letting him swim with bleeding ears and another time for a report that she was not following medical instructions to help Garnett gain needed weight. The child welfare department determined that Garnett was at "intermediate risk of neglect". There is no record of follow-up.



Lacey Spears is the person responsible for her son's death and it's very hard for authorities to piece patterns and suspicions together when a neglectful parent is moving around. But, based on the fatality report, there seem to have been glaring missed opportunities by both medical and child welfare authorities to help save Garnett Spears from his mother. Such an 'effin shame.

[HairOfTheDog]

Lacey Spears is such a piece of work.

The Journal News reports that Lacey Spears told prosecutors her son, Garnett, could have put sodium chloride into his own feeding tube and that might have been what killed him in January at a hospital in Valhalla.

The Journal News also reports that investigators believe Spears poisoned Garnett repeatedly over the course of four days during trips to the hospital's bathroom.

In June, assistant District Attorney Doreen Lloyd said in court that Spears had also searched the Internet to study what effects large amounts of salt would have on the boy. (Or, maybe the 5 year old did those searches to frame his mom for his suicide -- let's see if Lacey tosses that out next.)

Spears' lawyers filed a motion to have her confession suppressed because, they say, it was given involuntarily.

[cannongal]

Oct 15 court date

Prosecutors have cleared a key hurdle in their case against Lacey Spears, the former Chestnut Ridge mother accused of fatally poisoning her 5-year-old son with salt, convincing a judge they legally obtained evidence, such as feeding tube bags with high concentrations of sodium.

In a written decision issued before Wednesday's court hearing, Westchester County Judge Robert Neary ruled against nearly all of the defense motions, notably deciding all of the search warrants in the case were in order and opening the door for prosecutors to submit to the trial judge some of their most damning evidence.

Neary also denied a defense motion to dismiss the indictment against Spears and declared the case, which is under intense scrutiny and has gained national attention, ready for trial. The case is expected to be assigned to a trial judge on Oct. 23.

"The most important thing today is we have a court date," defense lawyer Stephen Riebling said. "We're moving forward."

Spears attended the hearing but did not speak, other than nodding as her lawyers whispered in her ear. Her eyes, which appeared puffy as if she was tired or had been crying, darted around the courtroom as she appeared in front of Neary, her every step recorded by half-a-dozen news media outlets who had been allowed to film in the courtroom.



Garnett Spears died as a result of salt poisoning, which prosecutors charge was poured down a gastrointestinal tube that was surgically placed into the boy's stomach when he was an infant.

One of the seized feeding tube bags was turned over to investigators by a friend of Lacey Spears who told them Spears instructed her to remove the bag from Spears' home and dispose of it.

Other seized evidence includes a laptop and cellphone Spears used to post thousands of social media updates charting the life and death of Garnett and to perform Internet searches on the dangers of high sodium in children, prosecutors said.

While Neary ruled all of the evidence was constitutionally obtained, the trial judge will still have to decide whether evidence is relevant to the case, isn't overly prejudicial and meets other standards of trial evidence, legal analysts said.

Investigators said they believe Spears suffers from Munchausen by proxy, a psychiatric condition in which someone harms someone in their care to garner sympathy and attention. Spears' lawyers had sought to preclude prosecutors from bringing up the disorder, saying they have not raised it as a defense and she has not been officially diagnosed.

But Neary declined to rule on the matter, in addition to whether Garnett's medical records from more than 40 different hospitals, pharmacies, doctors offices and other health care practitioners the boy saw over his lifetime are admissible. Defense lawyers will also have to bring those objections to the trial judge. Neary postponed to a pretrial hearing a decision regarding statements Spears made to law enforcement authorities.

"He's punting — for a lack of a better word — to the trial judge," said Larry Cunningham, associate academic dean at St. John's School of Law. "It's better that person makes the decision on evidentiary questions."

Cunningham said that while defense lawyers are usually the ones who bring up psychiatric issues — such as Munchausen — prosecutors may be introducing the concept to establish motive. But doing that also has its pitfalls, he said.

"It's a little bit of a chicken-and-egg problem in a sense," Cunningham said. "In order to establish that this is murder ... they have to establish that all of these (doctor and hospital) visits were not for a legitimate medical reason."

The case is perhaps one of the first in Westchester or Rockland counties to involve Munchausen, said many legal observers, including Ted Brundage, a former prosecutor and Harrison defense lawyer not involved in the case.

"I never even heard about Munchausen," said Brundage, who has been practicing for 30 years. "It's fascinating but for the fact that a child has died."

[cannongal]

Back in Court on Oct 23:

http://www.lohud.com/story/news/local/we.../17770173/

Scheduling conflicts of witnesses and lawyers have delayed the assigning of Lacey Spears' trial until at least December, a judge ruled Thursday.

The former Rockland County mother accused of fatally poisoning her 5-year-old son appeared in front of Westchester County Court Judge Richard Molea for a brief hearing. Prosecutors and defense lawyers asked to delay the setting of a trial date due to conflicts with scheduling of witnesses and another court case one of the prosecutors is working on, Molea said.

"At this point, we're not ready to set a firm date," he said.

Lawyers agreed to meet again Dec. 11 when they have more information on their schedules and a trial date may be set.

Spears, who was handcuffed in the back, briskly strode into the courtroom where she stood between her two lawyers, returning the greeting of "good morning" one of them made to her. She also nodded and responded to Molea when he greeted her, and at the end of the hearing, when Molea told her he would see her again in December, she replied in a clear voice, "Yes, sir."

[Duchess]

Another piece of shit mother. Sometimes I think they outnumber the ones who love their children with all their heart & soul.

[sally]

Not only that, but all the records that something wasn't right and no one gave a shit to follow up with it until he was near death.

[cannongal]

She had a court date a few days ago:

Story

A mommy blogger who has been charged with murdering her son appeared in a New York court on Thursday.

Lacey Spears of Chestnut Ridge, New York was in a courtroom almost a year after her son Garnett died from acute sodium poisoning.

Lacey has been accused of poisoning her son with salt, administering the fatal dose as the 5-year-old was receiving treatment in the hospital for hypernatremia - a condition that sees elevated salt levels in the blood.



Prosecutors revealed in court today that they would be bringing up a previous episode in which Garnett was suffering unusually high sodium levels, as well as some lies that Lacey may have told, calling her character into question.

The Journal News reports, 'attorneys said Garnett Spears suffered an earlier episode of high sodium levels at Children's Hospital in Alabama, presumably at the hands of his mother, Lacey Spears.'

They also intend to bring up claims that Lacey lied about being engaged to a man, who she claimed was Garnett's father, and claimed to have two other children who do not exist.

The trial is set to begin on January 26.

Lacey gained a national following online by writing about her son's numerous medical conditions.

[HairOfTheDog]

TRIAL UNDERWAY



Jury selection in the trial of 27-year-old Lacey Spears began today.

Spears, who made national headlines after chronicling her son's demise on social media, is charged with second-degree murder and first-degree manslaughter. The trial, before Judge Robert Neary, is expected to last several weeks.

While investigators have accused Spears of the psychiatric disease Munchausen by proxy — which causes caretakers, typically mothers, to sicken patients, typically their child, in order to gain attention and sympathy — prosecutors are prohibited from mentioning the condition in making their case.

Dr. Jennifer Canter of Maria Fareri Children's Hospital at Westchester Medical Center – the hospital where Spears' son, Garnett - 5, was killed with a fatal dose of salt poured through his stomach tube last January – will testify. "She will fill out how the investigation was completed," Prosecutor Murphy said. "She's the one who reaches out to the police through Child Protective Services."

Canter also will testify that there is "no medical explanation for the high sodium that was reflected in the tests at both Nyack (Hospital) and Westchester Medical Center," Murphy said. "(She) will not give an opinion with respect to her belief this is a case of Munchausen."

Spears' defense team was dealt a blow last week when (Judge) Neary ruled that certain medical records, social media posts detailing Garnett's declining health and online searches found on Spears' laptop, iPhone and iPad were admissible.

Story: http://www.lohud.com/story/news/local/we.../22345633/

[Duchess]

I could stone her without a single regret.

[Maggot]

Nothing 4 good horses and some strong leather straps couldn't fix.