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Post Info TOPIC: Mother charged with manslaughter.


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Mother charged with manslaughter.
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A mother found pushing her deceased son in a swing last May has now been arrested and charged in connection with the boy’s death. 

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A medical examiner said the boy died of dehydration and hypothermia after sitting in the swing for two days.

Romechia Marie Simms, 24 at the time the boy was found dead, was charged with manslaughter, first-degree child abuse and child neglect, according to an indictment announced Monday.

Investigators said Simms arrived at the park with her son shortly after 11 a.m. on May 20. He was alive at the time, they said. 

Family members have said Simms was suffering from mental illness. She was hospitalized after her son's death, and had been hospitalized for a brief period in the months beforehand.

Simms' mother, Vontasha Simms, said she was "totally flabbergasted" by the decision to bring criminal charges.

"No one in their right mind is going to sit out there for two days in the elements," she said, noting that her daughter was exposed to the weather and had no food or water, either, during those two days.

She said her daughter had just begun taking medication for her mental-health problems a couple of months before, and wondered whether there were problems getting the right medication or dosage. She said her daughter had been complaining of headaches before Ji'Aire's death.

"Somehow, somewhere within that episode, time stopped for her," Vontasha Simms said.

Vontasha Simms said she hopes to retain a private attorney to represent her daughter, but worries that she can't afford it.

Christopher Slobogin, a professor at Vanderbilt University's law school and an expert in mental health law, said prosecutors have leeway in deciding whether to bring criminal charges in cases like this. How much Simms' apparent mental illness affects the case depends on how strong the defense's argument is that she is ill, Slobogin said.

"If she's pushing her dead child in a swing that's pretty good evidence of serious impairment," Slobogin said.

After Monday's arraignment, Covington said he didn't know whether he might revisit the criminal charges if subsequent mental-health evaluations raise questions about Simms' sanity or competency. While he acknowledged that mental-health issues are part of the case, he said it would be up to the defense to bring forward a mental-illness defense.

He said he could not discuss specific facts of the case, including whether Simms had offered an explanation of her behavior to the authorities.

Earlier this year, the boy's father petitioned a District of Columbia court for custody of his son, saying Simms was behaving erratically and jumped out of a moving taxicab with Ji'Aire.

In court papers, Simms acknowledged she had had a mental breakdown but insisted she was doing better.

"This breakdown that I had was the first that I have ever had in my life and I truly believe it was from an extreme amount of stress weighing heavy on me. I am now in a much better productive space," she wrote in a letter to the judge.

In May, just days before Ji'Aire's death, a judge ordered the parents to share custody, and court records indicate both Simms and the boy's father agreed to the arrangement.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.



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She stood in the park pushing a swing for two days? And no one noticed??

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I think the first story I read didn't say that she had been there 2 days, just that she had been discovered pushing her dead child.

I am not surprised to read this update, though.

flan

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Dona Worry Be Happy wrote:

She stood in the park pushing a swing for two days? And no one noticed??


 Should someone have called the police? 

 



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Vette's SS!!

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Police? No. Someone should have talked to her. Asked her how she was, engaged her. I find it unlikely that the park would have been empty on a may afternoon or morning, that no one noticed her. I can't imagine the baby didn't get tired and hungry and fuss. I bet people noticed her, just didn't think it was their business, and now a baby is dead.

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Dona Worry Be Happy wrote:

Police? No. Someone should have talked to her. Asked her how she was, engaged her. I find it unlikely that the park would have been empty on a may afternoon or morning, that no one noticed her. I can't imagine the baby didn't get tired and hungry and fuss. I bet people noticed her, just didn't think it was their business, and now a baby is dead.


I'm sure they did notice her--but unless you stayed at the park for hours and hours, a mother pushing a child in a swing would not raise any suspicion. 



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huskerbb wrote:
Dona Worry Be Happy wrote:

Police? No. Someone should have talked to her. Asked her how she was, engaged her. I find it unlikely that the park would have been empty on a may afternoon or morning, that no one noticed her. I can't imagine the baby didn't get tired and hungry and fuss. I bet people noticed her, just didn't think it was their business, and now a baby is dead.


I'm sure they did notice her--but unless you stayed at the park for hours and hours, a mother pushing a child in a swing would not raise any suspicion. 


You think he would have been crying though. If he was hungry and cold. That would raise suspicion. 



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NAOW wrote:
huskerbb wrote:
Dona Worry Be Happy wrote:

Police? No. Someone should have talked to her. Asked her how she was, engaged her. I find it unlikely that the park would have been empty on a may afternoon or morning, that no one noticed her. I can't imagine the baby didn't get tired and hungry and fuss. I bet people noticed her, just didn't think it was their business, and now a baby is dead.


I'm sure they did notice her--but unless you stayed at the park for hours and hours, a mother pushing a child in a swing would not raise any suspicion. 


You think he would have been crying though. If he was hungry and cold. That would raise suspicion. 


You've never seen a parent with a fussy child?  How is that, in and of itself, in any way "suspicious"?  It's not.  



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huskerbb wrote:
NAOW wrote:
huskerbb wrote:
Dona Worry Be Happy wrote:

Police? No. Someone should have talked to her. Asked her how she was, engaged her. I find it unlikely that the park would have been empty on a may afternoon or morning, that no one noticed her. I can't imagine the baby didn't get tired and hungry and fuss. I bet people noticed her, just didn't think it was their business, and now a baby is dead.


I'm sure they did notice her--but unless you stayed at the park for hours and hours, a mother pushing a child in a swing would not raise any suspicion. 


You think he would have been crying though. If he was hungry and cold. That would raise suspicion. 


You've never seen a parent with a fussy child?  How is that, in and of itself, in any way "suspicious"?  It's not.  


 If a mother was pushing her child non-stop while the kid was fussy you wouldn't start to wonder? How old was the kid again?

I mean, when we go to the park we are usually there for at least an hour. If the mom was there and didn't leave the swings once even though the kid was crying I'd probably get closer to see what was going on. 



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Eventually someone did call--but it's not like that would be a suspicious activity. We actually don't know the kid was crying or when he actually died.

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Vette's SS

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Or maybe it was a secluded park and no one noticed her for more than a minute or two.

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NAOW wrote:

Or maybe it was a secluded park and no one noticed her for more than a minute or two.


I'm sure there were some people that said to themselves "huh, weird"--but if it didn't appear that the child was in immediate distress, they probably didn't think much of it.

 

I don't think people were intentionally callous--it just wasn't a situation that appeared overtly dangerous or harmful.  



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flan327 wrote:

I think the first story I read didn't say that she had been there 2 days, just that she had been discovered pushing her dead child.

I am not surprised to read this update, though.

flan


 Sadly, I am not surprised either.



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Most people are in their own little world and wouldn't really notice anything wrong just by a mother pushing a fussy kid on the swing.

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