Woman charged in death of her son

The DCF ruled, possibly to stop an inquiry, that there was no neglect despite reports of abuse and a filthy home.

©Associated Press
August 11, 2002

CRESTVIEW -- A woman has been charged with child neglect in the November death of her mentally impaired son, raising more concerns about the state's child welfare agency.

Okaloosa County sheriff's deputies arrested Michelle C. Wesson, 33, on Friday, saying she "habitually failed" to provide minimal care to 14-year-old James Alford.

Wesson was being held without bail Saturday at the Okaloosa County Jail in Crestview.

The Florida Department of Children and Families had ruled that the teenager did not die from child neglect despite more than 20 reports of abuse and neglect dating back to 1990.

When deputies found the teen Nov. 11, his home in Holt, a small town in the Florida Panhandle, was so filthy that several animals they removed had to be euthanized.

Though investigators repeatedly found the home teeming with roaches, maggots and flies and human and animal feces littering the floors, DCF officials concluded James' death didn't result from abuse or neglect. That decision hid the details of his case from public view.

"Charles Dickens couldn't come up with anything like this, it's so horrible," said Charles Mahan, professor of maternal and child health at the University of South Florida and a member of two blue-ribbon panels that studied the failures of the state's child protection system.

The state's child welfare agency has been immersed in scandal since officials acknowledged in April the disappearance of Rilya Wilson, a Miami girl missing since January 2001.

By closing the investigation without finding that James' death was caused by neglect, the DCF ensured that the Statewide Child Death Review Team, created by the Legislature to help prevent child deaths, would not evaluate DCF's performance in the case.

"Hopefully, not a lot of cases as egregious as this have missed our purview," said Dr. Michael Bell, deputy chief medical examiner in Broward County who heads the death review team.

An autopsy by Okaloosa County Associate Medical Examiner Michael Berkland revealed that Alford died of septicemia, likely brought on by unsanitary living conditions. Bacteria had essentially poisoned the boy's blood, Berkland found.

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