Two Different Moms In Two Different States Both Charged With Starving Kids To Death

By Erin Gloria Ryan  |  November 18, 2011 | 7:48pm
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Today in awful: Fearing their infant daughter would become fat and therefore gross, one Wisconsin couple attempted to limit their child’s food intake to preserve her sexy bikini ready baby physique. Now, the baby’s in protective custody and they’re being charged with child neglect. Meanwhile, in another neighborhood in Whattheeverlovingfucktown, an Ohio woman has been charged with involuntary manslaughter after starving her teenage daughter with cerebral palsy to death. Dr. Spock is spinning in his grave so fast that he’s creating an electrical current.

The New York Daily News case of Wisconsin couple Chris and Mary Sultze and their infant daughter caught the eye of the authorities when doctors noticed that she only weighed 7 pounds, 9 ounces at her four-month checkup. For months, they told doctors that some children just gain weight more slowly than others and that she’d catch up on her own schedule. In September, nearly a year after her 4-month checkup, the baby weighed only 13 pounds and doctors said she had no subcutaneous fat. The parents said the baby just had high metabolism and that they were feeding her plenty.

After much hemming and hawing, they allowed a local hospital to hold the baby for observation. She gained 8 ounces on the first day she was there, which upset her parents, who told doctors they wanted to take her home. Her father told doctors that he didn’t want to have fat kids, and that since he’d had heart problems, he was trying to prevent them in his daughter. That’s funny in a claw your hair out kind of way, since starvation can lead to the weakening of the heart muscle. But, you know. Parents know best.

They’ve been charges with felony child neglect. Of the case, the attorney for Mary Sultze said,

I have serious reservations about whether there’s any criminal activity here or just misguided parenting intentions. This is a case where we need to reserve judgment until we learn more details on exactly what occurred.

This looks like a case of parenting gone awry like the murder of Lizzy Borden’s parents was a case of wood chopping gone awry, but now the fate of the parents who wanted a slender baby is in the hands of the Wisconsin courts.

Now onto Ohio, America’s least fun state to drive through, where an entire team of caretakers failed to care for a 14 year old girl with cerebral palsy, who weighed only 28 pounds at the time of her death.

Makayla Norman was to be cared for by her mother Angela and a nurse, as well as two supervisors who were supposed to check in on the girl every few months. When she was rushed to the hospital earlier this year, she died within minutes. She was covered in bedsores, the house where she lived was filthy, and the cause of her death was ruled nutritional and medical neglect. The girl’s mother and primary care nurse are facing felony charges. The nurse’s two supervisors are being charged with misdemeanors.

Everything is horrible sometimes.

Wisconsin Couple Accused of Starving Infant Daughter [NYDN]
Ohio Mom Angela Norman Charged with Starving Teen Daughter to Death [HuffPo]

 
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