A 7-year-old girl believed to have been scalded and beaten to death in Laval instead inflicted the injuries on herself, which turned out to be fatal during a seizure, according to her mother’s trial.
Initially charged with criminal negligence that caused death and personal injury, the 37-year-old finally pleaded guilty to a reduced charge on Thursday morning at the Laval courthouse for failing to provide her daughter with essentials.
The Central Asian lady, who cannot be named due to a publication ban, is avoiding a jury trial, which was due to begin next month.
The case caused a stir in January 2021 when the child died. However, the summary of facts presented to the court reveals a nightmarish version of the months leading up to the tragedy, contrary to what was published at the time.
behavioral problems
According to the facts presented to the court, the girl had had significant behavioral problems since she was five years old. She particularly said that she liked hurting herself and expressed her desire to kill her little sister.
“She cannot speak openly about her daughter’s issues with members of her community because doing so may lead to judgment,” the agreed statement of fact reads.
Then the child became increasingly anxious and aggressive as a result of the delivery. The little girl then began repeatedly slapping her mother in the face, which she could not control.
She was then “exhausted and at the end of her tether,” Crown Prosecutor Me Karine Dalphond read to the defendant, her face streaming with tears.
The situation between the accused and her daughter continued to deteriorate until the victim refused any contact with her mother in the fall of 2020. She even forbade him to look at her and ordered him to remain locked in his room.
A few weeks before the girl’s death, her mother was seen in a shop, her face badly cut and bruised from her child’s seizures.
When an acquaintance tries to approach the mother, “the little girl starts hitting her, hitting her hard and telling her to stop talking,” the joint statement of facts reads.
fateful days
On December 31, 2020, the defendant saw her daughter’s blood-stained sweater in her bathroom sink.
“She thinks she might be hurt but is afraid to leave her room to ask for fear of creating a crisis,” we told the court.
Three times over the next 72 hours, a family member who lived under the same roof and usually looked after the victim asked the defendant to go to the pharmacy to buy bandages and salt water.
When asked what happened, the woman caring for the child said the victim “did it to herself in the basement shower and added it was probably a skin reaction to the hot water.”
The defendant asked no further questions and no longer approached her daughter, whom she saw only once from behind.
She first saw her child on January 3, 2021, when the child was placed at the foot of her bed. The child was already dead by then.
The defendant called 911 minutes later after taking her youngest daughter to an acquaintance.
The victim was then taken to the hospital, where he was officially pronounced dead. According to the autopsy, the cause was “very severe burns that extended over 70% of his body”. These are compatible with burns caused by hot water.
However, the victim’s little sister revealed a few months later that the woman caring for her sister “pinched her and was able to pour hot water on her body”.
Police investigations are ongoing, but no other family members have been charged in the case.
The Crown called for a jail sentence of two years less a day, while the defense instead advocated a suspended sentence with community service.
Judge Yvan Poulin will deliver his verdict next April.
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