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Parents won't face charges
By JAMIE MALERNEE © St. Petersburg Times, published January 25, 2001 The parents of a 2-month-old boy who choked to death on baby formula will not be charged, prosecutors announced Wednesday. Assistant State Attorney Don Scaglione said there is not enough evidence to prove that Earl and Jeanette Engle of Spring Hill were negligent in the care of their son, Jasen Albert Engle. His death last September has been ruled an accident. "You have to have evidence to show the gross and flagrant actions, or inactions, were the cause of death," Scaglione said. "We didn't have that. There wasn't enough . . . to charge them with manslaughter." Officials were originally concerned that there might be a connection between the way Jasen died and problems the couple had had with their two older sons. Authorities had taken the other sons from the couple before Jasen was born after doctors said one of the siblings was not being fed properly and appeared malnourished. The Engles, who live at 6331 Holiday Drive in Spring Hill, were charged with child neglect in that case, which is pending. The boys' grandparents, who have custody of Jasen's brothers, have told investigators that Engle did not allow his second son to be burped after he was fed and that the father refused to let the boy eat more even if he was still hungry. But Scaglione said there is no evidence that the Engles did anything illegal in the death of their third son. The medical examiner ruled that Jasen appeared well-fed and cared for, Scaglione said in a memo to the Hernando County Sheriff's Office. Whether Engle allowed Jasen to be burped before the boy choked to death is not known. The Engles have never spoken to authorities about what happened on the evening their son died and could not be reached for comment Wednesday. But in an interview with the St. Petersburg Times shortly after Jasen's death, Mrs. Engle said she had laid her son down for a nap in a playpen at her mother-in-law's house in Spring Hill. When she went to check on the baby, she said, he wasn't breathing. She added that her son was sick and might have choked on mucus. The medical examiner found no sign of illness, however, and ruled that Jasen accidentally choked on formula. Even if the Engles had not burped their son, that wouldn't necessarily mean they were culpably negligent, according to law. "Culpable negligence is more than failure to use ordinary care," Scaglione wrote in his memo. "(It) . . . is showing reckless disregard for human life, . . . consciously doing an act or following a course of conduct that the (parents) must have known, or reasonably should have known, was likely to cause death or great bodily harm." Bad parenting is not necessarily a crime, he said, although "any loss of life is tragic, and more so with the death of a child." To show the murkiness of the issue, Scaglione used an analogy of parents walking in a park with their child. Some parents would hold on tightly to their child's hand, he said. Others would let the child play 15 feet away. "If that child runs into the street and gets hit (by a car), is that manslaughter?" he asked. "There's no bright-line rule."
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From today's Hernando Times |
