Gaime has many sides, some say

The mother of Mathew and Adam Rotell could be attentive as well as emotional, they say.

Kristina Gaime is taken from University Community Hospital to Hillsborough County Jail early Wednesday. [Times photo: Thomas M. Goethe]

By JAMES THORNER

© St. Petersburg Times, published May 6, 1999

LAND O'LAKES -- In a neighborhood that has known little peace since the killing of Mathew Rotell three weeks ago, the reappearance of TV cameras Wednesday struck neighbors as a bad sign.

It was.

The reporters brought news that their onetime neighbor, Kristina Gaime, is accused of murdering her son Mathew with an overdose of morphine.

Adam Rotell, Mathew's brother, was also administered morphine in what investigators say was Gaime's attempt to kill herself and her children.

Few people got a closer look at Gaime during her six months living on Clubside Loop in the Lake Heron neighborhood than Paul Wavrock and his girlfriend, Lynn Tait. They lived in adjoining town houses.

After speculation for three weeks about who killed Mathew, Gaime's arrest seemed inevitable to Wavrock. He remembers Gaime for her hawk-like attentiveness to her children. Even when walking their dog, the children couldn't venture from in front of the house.

But he also recalls several episodes that showed Gaime's temper, such as when she stormed over to Wavrock's house, concerned that the drill he was using to hang shelves was frightening the boys.

"She came over and complained that the kids thought someone was coming through the walls to get them," he said. "She kept trying to be the super-parent, but she came off being hysterical."

The impression of Gaime was more favorable at Kid Stuff Preschool & Day Care, across the street from her home. The Rotell brothers attended the school about three years ago, before the family moved to Lake Heron.

Owner Cathy Peckett had only kind words after hearing about the murder charges on TV Wednesday morning.

"I think it's very sad. We're all very sad. There's not much more to say," Peckett said. "She was a wonderful mother. Very caring and very involved."

Taking the murder-suicide attempt allegation equally hard were parents of children from Denham Oaks Elementary, the school attended by Mathew and Adam.

Colleen Passardi, whose 9-year-old son brushed elbows with the Rotells in school, kept repeating one word: "horrible."

"Obviously she is sick. She is ill. I just can't imagine it," she said.

Passardi sympathized mostly with Adam Rotell, the 8-year-old whose life has taken a disastrous turn.

"He's left having to deal with knowing his brother is dead," she said. "And his mother may have tried to kill him, too."