Kristina Gaime is in the jail's medical wing but is off a 24-hour suicide watch.
By AMY ELLIS
© St. Petersburg Times, published May 13, 1999
LAND O'LAKES -- After eight days in a mental hospital, Kristina Gaime was released to Pasco sheriff's deputies Wednesday afternoon and taken to the county jail.
Accused of killing one son and trying to kill another, Gaime, 34, had been under 24-hour suicide watch at The Harbor in New Port Richey since her arrest May 4.
Sheriff's spokesman Jon Powers said doctors at The Harbor determined Gaime was well enough to be released, but he would not say whether they still considered her suicidal.
At the jail, Gaime is in the medical wing, away from other inmates, Powers said. She will be kept "under close observation" but not round-the-clock suicide watch.
"I'm not going to discuss anything related to her medical condition," Powers said. "There are some medical and mental health issues that need to be evaluated. She will not be in the general population."
Earlier in the day, Gaime's attorney said doctors told him she would likely be at The Harbor for at least a few more days. Angelo Ferlita said he did not know she was being transferred until reporters called him late Wednesday.
"That was my understanding -- that she was still being evaluated and they were not sure when she could be released," said Ferlita, one of two Tampa attorneys representing Gaime. "I plan to get in and see her as soon as I can, to assess her condition."
About 3 p.m., Gaime was taken by transport van to the county jail in Land O'Lakes, where she was booked on charges of first-degree murder and first-degree attempted murder. She will be held without bail until her arraignment May 27.
At her first court appearance last week, Gaime sat in a wheelchair, lifting herself up on one side to relieve pressure on the third-degree burns on her buttocks.
Gaime has multiple burns and blisters on her body, which her attorneys say may need skin graft surgery. Powers would not say whether Gaime may be transferred to another hospital for surgery.
If she doesn't get treatment soon, Gaime could develop gangrene, Ferlita said.
"They need to be aware that she is in very poor physical condition," he said. "And if she develops gangrene, they're buying that."
Two forensics experts who reviewed photographs of her injuries for the Times said they may be blisters caused by carbon monoxide poisoning.
Investigators say Gaime gave her children six morphine tablets, injected them with morphine and tried to kill herself and them by carbon monoxide poisoning.
Adam, 8, and Gaime survived, but Mathew, 6, was found dead in his mother's minivan the next morning, April 12, by his grandmother, Kathleen McDuffie.
Court papers filed this week indicate Gaime may have thought about killing herself long before Mathew's death.
Some 41 pages of notes and letters from Gaime were seized from her Lake Heron town home shortly after Mathew's death. An affidavit says Gaime had "within the recent past contemplated suicide."
Though details of the letters, both handwritten and typed, were not released, investigators believe they may reveal why Gaime tried to take her life and the lives of her boys.
Powers said he could not discuss the contents of the letters. Ferlita said he had not seen them.
Also taken when deputies served a search warrant at Gaime's house was a safe, which contained a white New Testament, legal papers, receipts and 19 photographs of Mathew's anus.
Gaime claimed three times that her ex-husband, Stephen Rotell, had sexually abused the boys, though the charges were all deemed unfounded.
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