Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Parents starve toddler son to death, leave body in toy chest

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Parents starve toddler son to death, leave body in toy chest · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:05
Speaker 1: Crime stories with Nancy Grace and the remains of a
0:12
Speaker 1: three year old child stuffed in a toy box. The
0:16
Speaker 1: remains were found in a blue, apparently toy chest. That's
0:22
Speaker 1: when they saw. I saw them looking at this. I
0:25
Speaker 1: don't know. I believe it was like a toy box.
0:28
Speaker 1: I don't know. It wasn't that big. The parents of
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Speaker 1: that toddler are now under arrest, thirty nine year old
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Speaker 1: Raquel Barreras and forty five year old Martin Barreras. Police
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Speaker 1: say three year old Ramone Barreras was forced to live
0:41
Speaker 1: in a structure that was attached to the outside of
0:43
Speaker 1: the home when he was alive. That blue toy chest
0:47
Speaker 1: where the landlord found his remains, that was inside that structure.
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Speaker 1: Now Ramone's mother, Raquel Baredas, is charged with first degree murder.
0:54
Speaker 1: Both she and his father, Martin Barreras, are charged with
0:57
Speaker 1: child abuse, but police say more charges could come. The
1:00
Speaker 1: family was evicted not too long ago, and the landlord
1:03
Speaker 1: was cleaning the property yesterday when they came across this
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Speaker 1: blue toy chest and opened it up. The couple has
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Speaker 1: four other children. The oldest is nineteen and the youngest
1:12
Speaker 1: living child is four. You're hearing our friend Simone del
1:16
Speaker 1: Rosaru at kgU NTV in Tucson. I'm Nancy Grace. This
1:21
Speaker 1: is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. This
1:25
Speaker 1: case very very difficult to report. The reason we are
1:31
Speaker 1: tackling it here on Crime Stories is in the hopes
1:35
Speaker 1: that it will never happen again. Joining me an all
1:39
Speaker 1: star panel. Doctor William Moroney, Deputy medical Examiner, Bay County,
1:43
Speaker 1: Michigan and author of American Narcan on Amazon, veteran Atlanta prosecutor,
1:49
Speaker 1: Kenya Johnson, Joseph Scott Morgan, forensics expert at Jacksonville State University,
1:54
Speaker 1: author of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon, and doctor
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Speaker 1: Karen Stark, psychologists out of New York. You can find
2:00
Speaker 1: her at karenstart dot com. Right now to John Limley,
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Speaker 1: Crime Online dot Com investigative reporter. John is very disturbing
2:09
Speaker 1: to me that the only way this child was found
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Speaker 1: was because the family was basically kicked out of their residence. John,
2:16
Speaker 1: let's start at the beginning. This eviction you're talking about
2:20
Speaker 1: was just earlier in the year. This family, the Barrera's family,
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Speaker 1: It is a couple Martin and Raquel and their five
2:30
Speaker 1: children were living in this Tucson Triplex just north of
2:34
Speaker 1: the airport. They were evicted from their human from their unit.
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Speaker 1: In moving out, they left quite a mess, a lot
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Speaker 1: of their belongings scattered inside and outside the home. The
2:45
Speaker 1: building's landlord, as we heard, hired a crew to clean
2:48
Speaker 1: up the property and get it ready for new tenants.
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Speaker 1: While they were gathering up everything that was left behind,
2:54
Speaker 1: they started working on getting things out of this structure
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Speaker 1: attached to the unit in the back. One of the
3:01
Speaker 1: things inside was a blue toy box, which they first
3:05
Speaker 1: moved outside with the rest of the family's stuff. Once
3:08
Speaker 1: they opened the box, when they got it outside, they
3:13
Speaker 1: discovered something that no one in a million years would
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Speaker 1: have expected to find, the decomposed body of a small child.
3:21
Speaker 1: What do we know about the little boy? The little
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Speaker 1: boy was kept from the better part of the family
3:27
Speaker 1: for years. There are aunts and uncles and grandparents who
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Speaker 1: had never even seen the child before. The couple, because
3:36
Speaker 1: of problems with the law they had had over the years,
3:40
Speaker 1: had become very secretive, cloistered and just didn't even contact
3:46
Speaker 1: family members, let alone let anyone come into the home.
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Speaker 1: There were even some family members that didn't even know
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Speaker 1: that Roman had been born, that he existed at the
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Speaker 1: time of his death. It's amazing to me that this
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Speaker 1: little boy, a three year old little boy, lived in
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Speaker 1: relative anonymity, while the siblings were known by relatives, by
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Speaker 1: neighborhood members. How did they pull it off? Listen to
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Speaker 1: our friend Craig Smith at kgU N. This was the
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Speaker 1: last house where Martin and Riquel Berrera lived, the house
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Speaker 1: where police actually came to arrest them. The boy's body
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Speaker 1: was actually found some distance from here now. The family
4:27
Speaker 1: members say that couple would change addresses anytime they thought
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Speaker 1: someone was about to figure out where they lived. Some
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Speaker 1: of them said they pushed that couple for details on
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Speaker 1: how that child was doing, details to make sure he
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Speaker 1: was okay. But family members say many of them never
4:43
Speaker 1: even saw that child at first. Ramond Berrera's uncles and
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Speaker 1: aunts did not know. The sad story of a boy's
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Speaker 1: bones would touch them. Think it's very shocking when you
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Speaker 1: hear something like that and you pray to God, this
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Speaker 1: child someone you know. Now they know the boy was
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Speaker 1: Romand Berrera, a three year old. Many of them never
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Speaker 1: even saw because they say Romand's parents kept in hidden.
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Speaker 1: You know, they would move from one place to the next,
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Speaker 1: which made it very difficult for any of the authorities
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Speaker 1: to keep up with the child. How does that work,
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Speaker 1: Kenya Johnson, This is something that we see often. These
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Speaker 1: are deceptive measures that the parents are using to avoid detection.
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Speaker 1: And so by moving around that creates when you go
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Speaker 1: to different jurisdictions, they're different case files, and oftentimes the
5:41
Speaker 1: jurisdictions don't speak to each other. So if the child
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Speaker 1: protective services in one area was investigating the family, they
5:49
Speaker 1: move and then everything resets, and now it takes a
5:52
Speaker 1: while for the neighbors to become concerned with the behavior
5:56
Speaker 1: and to report it. And you always start fresh in
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Speaker 1: every new jersdiction. And so this is a way to
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Speaker 1: stay under the radar so that the public in neighbors
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Speaker 1: can't put two and two together. And I'm curious about
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Speaker 1: why no one at school or preschool knew anything going
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Speaker 1: on with the child. Listened to stella Ingrid Kgun Today,
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Speaker 1: we reached out to TUSD to find out if any
6:20
Speaker 1: of the children ever went to school. A spokesperson says
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Speaker 1: they did have three children registered at TUSD schools, the
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Speaker 1: girls never actually showed up. A twelve year old boy
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Speaker 1: did come from time to time to Van Buskirk Elementary.
6:32
Speaker 1: He was in fourth grade. TUSD says when he didn't
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Speaker 1: show up consistently, they sent a community representative and a
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Speaker 1: dropout prevention specialists several times to the homes. No one
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Speaker 1: ever answered the door. TUSD filed two reports with CPS
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Speaker 1: in October and November of twenty thirteen. They also asked
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Speaker 1: police to do a welfare check, you know, a welfare
6:54
Speaker 1: check to doctor William Moroney, joining me, renowned medical examiner,
6:58
Speaker 1: joining us out of Michigan, author of American Narkian. Doctor Moroney,
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Speaker 1: You've done so many autopsies you probably don't even know
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Speaker 1: how many at this point, thousands. It's got to be
7:10
Speaker 1: so difficult when you autopsy a child and then you
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Speaker 1: learn that all of the systems, you know, safety catches
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Speaker 1: have failed. For instance, nobody even followed up when these
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Speaker 1: children did not go to school. You know what, doctor Moroney.
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Speaker 1: Before you answer that, listen to mankie Vespa immediately report
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Speaker 1: show hospital staff noticed the newborn's jitteriness, shrill, crying, and
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Speaker 1: high irritability, signs of withdrawal from Rachael Barreras's admitted drug use.
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Speaker 1: Percocet and methadone in the years and months leading right
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Speaker 1: up to her son's birth. Eventually the symptoms subsided, giving
7:48
Speaker 1: way to a new problem again, concerns about not bonding
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Speaker 1: with her youngest child, Roman, adding she does not express
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Speaker 1: affection or interest in the child, a behavior that quickly
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Speaker 1: produced to dire results. Report Shoubriquell forced Roman to sleep
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Speaker 1: in the laundry room. She would beat him with a
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Speaker 1: broom and cover the bruises with makeup. More than a
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Speaker 1: year before his death, one CPS investigator warned Roman faces
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Speaker 1: serious injury, grievous suffering, impairment, and even death. His case
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Speaker 1: was classified as Level one, the highest risk. CPS recommended
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Speaker 1: Riquell not be allowed around the children. The problem. Case
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Speaker 1: workers describe Romand's father, Martin, as easily manipulated by his wife,
8:32
Speaker 1: adding he was quote unable to be objective about the
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Speaker 1: threats too. Doctor William Maroney, When you autopsy a little child,
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Speaker 1: a three year old, and you find out that child
8:43
Speaker 1: protective services have left the child and the home, that's
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Speaker 1: got to be so upsetting. For twenty years we have
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Speaker 1: been following the death of children knowing that they were
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Speaker 1: left in the home. State workers sometimes are victims to
9:04
Speaker 1: a terrible political system that won't let them act, and
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Speaker 1: sometimes they're given the leeway to pull the plug, but
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Speaker 1: they just won't and we cannot understand. But the fact
9:16
Speaker 1: that everybody does evaluations and doesn't talk to anybody else,
9:21
Speaker 1: everybody lives in these silos, ends up in the autopsy
9:26
Speaker 1: of children, and sometimes very young children. The autopsy of
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Speaker 1: a child is a very moving, emotional and spiritual event.
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Speaker 1: It is like no other autopsy of a human being.
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Speaker 1: It's quieter, it's more reverent, and it takes a pace
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Speaker 1: where you're looking for the absolute most minute details. And
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Speaker 1: when you know that somebody's been an abused child, you
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Speaker 1: clearly have a forensic autopsy that could end up in court,
10:06
Speaker 1: as opposed to a hospital autopsy, which is just looking
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Speaker 1: to fill a piece of paper with a diagnosis. So
10:13
Speaker 1: those make the autopsy of children and babies very special
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Speaker 1: events and it's very heartbreaking to be in one, and
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Speaker 1: it's ten times the heartbreaking to know that it's the
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Speaker 1: result of child abuse. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace straight
10:50
Speaker 1: out to Professor Forensics Jacksonville State University, author of Blood
10:54
Speaker 1: Beneath My Fate, Joseph Scott Morgan, your expertise is evidence.
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Speaker 1: How can it be that there's so much evidence that
11:03
Speaker 1: this child is being mistreated? And Joe Scott, he didn't
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Speaker 1: die a quick death. It wasn't blunt trauma. He died
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Speaker 1: a starvation. The brothers and sisters would say, they try
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Speaker 1: to sneak him crackers. I mean, what a horrible, horrible life.
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Speaker 1: What about the evidence? What evidence would there have been?
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Speaker 1: Would there have been a trail of this child's life,
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Speaker 1: Joe Scott, No, not if the family had kept him sequestered.
11:29
Speaker 1: That has been implied in this particular case. I think
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Speaker 1: that probably after this child was born and they were
11:37
Speaker 1: able to kind of extricate themselves from the environment at
11:40
Speaker 1: the hospital, this child literally was a drift and the
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Speaker 1: only salvation that he had was his parents, and they
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Speaker 1: didn't offer any assistance. So he's kind of wiped. You know,
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Speaker 1: at the end of the day, the only evidence that
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Speaker 1: we really have is that little skeleton that's left behind,
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Speaker 1: and that's a horrible, horrible thing. Think about this, Nancy,
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Speaker 1: This three year old child. On average, a three year
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Speaker 1: old child should weigh somewhere in the neighborhood of about
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Speaker 1: thirty pounds. There's literally nothing left of him other than
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Speaker 1: his skeletal remains, and that's a horrible statement when you
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Speaker 1: think about it. So how are you going to trace
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Speaker 1: this back? It's almost like you're looking for negative findings here.
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Speaker 1: There's nothing there. The other people were were being fed
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Speaker 1: in the home, they were able to sustain, and that's
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Speaker 1: a big point of order here. When you go to
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Speaker 1: court with something like this, you say that everybody else
12:34
Speaker 1: was receiving nourishment in this home. But here we have
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Speaker 1: Ramon who is just left to languish and to die.
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Speaker 1: And he wasn't just stuffed into a toy box. He
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Speaker 1: was left in a toy box that was his one existence,
12:50
Speaker 1: essentially sequestered from the rest of the family. It's absolutely disgusting.
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Speaker 1: You know, doctor Karen Stark, psychologist joining us out of Manhattan.
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Speaker 1: You can find her at Karen Stark. The reality is
13:02
Speaker 1: this is a child they picked to murder, and a
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Speaker 1: lot of people are blaming the mom, but the dad
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Speaker 1: stood by and let it happen. He's just as guilty.
13:13
Speaker 1: In my mind, Why is it so often one child
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Speaker 1: out of many, one child is targeted? Well, the mother
13:21
Speaker 1: is taking her rage and anger out on one child,
13:25
Speaker 1: not all of the children. She either identifies with the
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Speaker 1: child for some reason, or the child was born at
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Speaker 1: the wrong time. Nancy, It's reprehensible, but it really does
13:35
Speaker 1: happen where there is one child that gets picked on
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Speaker 1: and nothing can be done about it, and unless authority
13:43
Speaker 1: step in, and in this case nobody gives the fact
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Speaker 1: that they left the child's remains behind also a big
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Speaker 1: signal to me how little they cared about the child.
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Speaker 1: I mean, they packed everything else up when they left,
14:00
Speaker 1: and they left him and the toy box behind. I mean,
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Speaker 1: doctor Moroney, I don't understand how a year passes and
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Speaker 1: you can still de trauma cause of death. How can
14:08
Speaker 1: you do that again? You say, you begin with a
14:12
Speaker 1: full body X race to look and see if there's
14:16
Speaker 1: been any trauma, fractures or blunt force to the skeletal structure,
14:22
Speaker 1: and then the actual size of the organs and muscle
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Speaker 1: mass versus fat. Weans down the fact that you may
14:33
Speaker 1: have had malnourishment, but toxicology might show that this child
14:39
Speaker 1: has also been poisoned, and those are all fair game
14:42
Speaker 1: and testing in a forensic autopsy. You know, it was
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Speaker 1: so upsetting that when the people came in to clean
14:52
Speaker 1: up the home to get it ready for the next residence,
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Speaker 1: they found this toy box and they actually thought that
15:01
Speaker 1: this skeleton was part of Halloween decorations. That's how skeletonized
15:08
Speaker 1: his body was What does that mean, Joe Scott. What
15:11
Speaker 1: that means, Nancy, is that it's a surreal moment for
15:15
Speaker 1: the people that discover this child's body and or what
15:19
Speaker 1: remained of the body, because the child is diminished now
15:22
Speaker 1: to the point or the remains are diminished now to
15:24
Speaker 1: the point where presumably you don't even have any soft
15:28
Speaker 1: tissue left that the body has been there for this
15:31
Speaker 1: protracted period of time, so that skeletonization has taken place,
15:35
Speaker 1: and that really leaves you scratching your head as an
15:38
Speaker 1: investigator as to what you're going to list the cause
15:41
Speaker 1: of death as and at the end of the day,
15:45
Speaker 1: you know, I'm sure that there were some metrics that
15:47
Speaker 1: were taken relative to this event, particularly developmentally the skeleton,
15:53
Speaker 1: what was left behind, the growth rate of the bones,
15:56
Speaker 1: and this sort of thing. So that's going to kind
15:59
Speaker 1: of paint the picture what they're looking at, and I'm
16:01
Speaker 1: sure that that's what they're going to court with. Well,
16:02
Speaker 1: would that look like doctor Moroni. For the people to
16:05
Speaker 1: actually think that his remains were a halloween you know,
16:10
Speaker 1: skeleton to be hung up as a decoration. What does
16:15
Speaker 1: that mean to you as a forensic expert, a medical examiner?
16:20
Speaker 1: What did those remains look like? And why? We know
16:23
Speaker 1: that seventy percent of the normal body is water, only
16:29
Speaker 1: thirty percent of the body is solid mass. So you
16:33
Speaker 1: take a three year old and you take whatever weight
16:36
Speaker 1: that three year old is, and you make it thirty
16:39
Speaker 1: percent of whatever that weight is the average normal, average
16:43
Speaker 1: three year old, And that shows you how small and
16:48
Speaker 1: how contracted and how unrecognizable the human body can be
16:53
Speaker 1: at thirty percent of its solid mass. We are talking
16:57
Speaker 1: about a little boy, Roman Barras found his remains found
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Speaker 1: just his bones, so skeletonized, so devoid of any tissue
17:09
Speaker 1: or hair, that the cleaners that found him stuffed in
17:13
Speaker 1: the toy box thought he was actually a halloween decoration.
17:19
Speaker 1: How did it come to this? Many people now blaming
17:23
Speaker 1: the mother? Why is that? John Linly, Why is the
17:27
Speaker 1: mother and not the father being blamed? It seems that
17:30
Speaker 1: over time the father had actually tried to intervene. There
17:36
Speaker 1: was a lot of anger that the mom seemed to
17:39
Speaker 1: show towards this child, and the father would try to
17:43
Speaker 1: sort of diffuse that, try to pull her back from
17:48
Speaker 1: her anger and her abuse of the child. She just
17:52
Speaker 1: as time went by, was her drug problems became more
17:56
Speaker 1: and more intense, so did her abuse of the child
18:00
Speaker 1: as well, to the point that she was making the
18:03
Speaker 1: child live in this attached structure. Out back to Kenya Johnson,
18:08
Speaker 1: veteran Atlanta prosecutor, drugs smugs. I don't care she's on
18:11
Speaker 1: drugs or was on drugs or had anger issues. That's
18:15
Speaker 1: not a defense, ken Yea. It absolutely is not a defense.
18:18
Speaker 1: And it seems like there had been enough interaction with
18:22
Speaker 1: the child protective services that some sort of plan should
18:25
Speaker 1: have been taken into place or put in place for
18:28
Speaker 1: her to keep her children or the children should be removed.
18:32
Speaker 1: And so this is a system of oversight that is
18:36
Speaker 1: overburdened that they're aren't enough case managers. Training is an issue,
18:42
Speaker 1: and so to have people constantly coming to the house
18:45
Speaker 1: is a challenge and being slipped through the cracks, and
18:48
Speaker 1: this is what happened with Roman. He slipped through the cracks.
19:05
Speaker 1: Crime stories with Nancy Grace, Well, the jury just wrapped
19:14
Speaker 1: up its eighth day of trial. It all took place
19:17
Speaker 1: up on the sixth floor here at the Superior Chords Building.
19:20
Speaker 1: That's where they heard closing arguments. The prosecution went first.
19:25
Speaker 1: They showed the jury a picture of the kitchen ware
19:28
Speaker 1: Raquel Barrera's cooked the family meals, with Little Roman nearby
19:32
Speaker 1: in a playpin in a dark corner, watching and smelling
19:35
Speaker 1: the food. There's also a picture of the laundry room
19:39
Speaker 1: where prosecutors say Roman was kept and locked in. Gentleman,
19:43
Speaker 1: she is guilty. She is guilty because as his arrogator
19:50
Speaker 1: and his mother, she paused his person and out to
19:54
Speaker 1: be Indeed, you don't feed any heat, they're not going
19:59
Speaker 1: to be okay. She caused or permitted him to be
20:04
Speaker 1: placed in a situation where he wasn't. New defense attorney
20:08
Speaker 1: John O'Brien says that little Roman had cancer and was
20:11
Speaker 1: supposed to be getting treatments, treatments that he never received.
20:15
Speaker 1: The defense attorney says that's because the father did not
20:19
Speaker 1: take him for those treatments. Did John Limley Crimalline dot
20:22
Speaker 1: Com investigative reporter John Limley hearing Lupete and Maria there
20:27
Speaker 1: at News four and two. Soundscribe the family going about
20:31
Speaker 1: their business, but the little boy being locked up. I mean,
20:36
Speaker 1: it's devastating, and it was long periods of time that
20:40
Speaker 1: he was forced to live in this sort of lean
20:43
Speaker 1: to an attached structure in the back, while the four
20:48
Speaker 1: siblings would be inside in enjoying to a certain extent,
20:54
Speaker 1: a fairly normal life, eating their meals occasionally when they
20:59
Speaker 1: would go to school, maybe doing homework as well, but
21:03
Speaker 1: the child completely isolated from the rest of the family
21:08
Speaker 1: for days and weeks. It seems as if the defense
21:11
Speaker 1: was that everyone else is responsible. Accept the mom and
21:17
Speaker 1: dad listen to our friend Eliah Shahid at Niece four.
21:20
Speaker 1: Opening statements wrapped up this morning, the prosecution using their
21:24
Speaker 1: time to paint a picture of a woman who they
21:27
Speaker 1: say abused her son and watched as he slowly starved
21:31
Speaker 1: to death, while the defense painted Raquel Barreras as an
21:34
Speaker 1: overwhelmed mother who was working through poverty and addiction. In
21:39
Speaker 1: her opening statement to the prosecuting attorney said Raquel Berreres
21:43
Speaker 1: treated Roman differently than her other children, keeping him isolated.
21:47
Speaker 1: The prosecution arguing Raquel knowingly and intentionally abused her child
21:52
Speaker 1: in a way that could lead to death. And in
21:54
Speaker 1: doing so, murdered him. You think both along we can.
22:04
Speaker 1: The defense doesn't argue that Quel put Roman's remains in
22:09
Speaker 1: the toy chests. She's already pleaded guilty to abandonment or
22:13
Speaker 1: concealment of a body, but they say she did not
22:16
Speaker 1: murder her son, who they called medically compromised. The defense
22:20
Speaker 1: shifting blame to the Department of Child's Safety as well
22:23
Speaker 1: as to Roman's father an adult sister people. They say
22:27
Speaker 1: it could have done more to help the toddler when
22:29
Speaker 1: he was alive while his mother battled addiction. I mean
22:33
Speaker 1: to Karen Star, psychologists out of New York. To me,
22:36
Speaker 1: that's just shifting the blame. If the mom was addicted, yes,
22:39
Speaker 1: I want her to get help, but that does not
22:42
Speaker 1: relieve her of liability and responsibility for her baby. Absolutely, Nancy.
22:47
Speaker 1: I mean, there are people who are addicted and they
22:50
Speaker 1: are able to care for their children. And if the
22:54
Speaker 1: I mean this mom, she needed to take it out
22:58
Speaker 1: on this one child and torture. She actually tortured this baby,
23:04
Speaker 1: this little boy, and something should have been done about
23:07
Speaker 1: the mom. Really, the mom, because the dad seems like
23:11
Speaker 1: he was himself just a with them. He was kind
23:14
Speaker 1: of brainwashed into going along with this and didn't feel
23:18
Speaker 1: strong enough to go up against her. But she is
23:20
Speaker 1: culpable for you to take it. Listen to the sister
23:25
Speaker 1: testifying about her mom, talking about the mom describing the
23:30
Speaker 1: little boy as being quote bad and had to be punished.
23:35
Speaker 1: This is Ali Potter and he's for today. Roman sister
23:38
Speaker 1: testified and said she asked her mom why Roman was
23:42
Speaker 1: left inside that toy chest, and the mom replied he
23:45
Speaker 1: was very, very, very bad. The brother of Roman also
23:49
Speaker 1: testified and said he remembers looking inside the toy box
23:53
Speaker 1: in the backyard before they moved, and he got emotional
23:56
Speaker 1: and said that he saw his little brother dead inside.
24:00
Speaker 1: And another sister talked about how Raquel wouldn't let her
24:04
Speaker 1: four other kids play with Roman and said it was
24:07
Speaker 1: none of their business. According to an autopsy report, the
24:10
Speaker 1: child died from starvation and neglect, and also the kids.
24:13
Speaker 1: They even talked about how Roman was kept inside a
24:16
Speaker 1: laundry room that was located outside their house and two
24:21
Speaker 1: of the kids would try to sneak to feed at
24:23
Speaker 1: their three year old little brother, Crackers. So Joseph Scott Morgan,
24:27
Speaker 1: Professor Forensics, Jacksonville State University Joe Scott. How long would
24:32
Speaker 1: it take to actually starve a child? A lot has
24:35
Speaker 1: to be considered here. Nancy was a child, was a
24:38
Speaker 1: child in the beginning, receiving proper nourishment, you know, when
24:42
Speaker 1: they started their journey in life. You know, as far
24:46
Speaker 1: as the feedings took place then, and so as the
24:48
Speaker 1: child already in a diminished state. Once you get to
24:51
Speaker 1: the point where they're proactively starving the child. In normal circumstances,
24:58
Speaker 1: it would take probably you could probably starve a child
25:01
Speaker 1: to death within about forty to sixty days. But in
25:05
Speaker 1: this case, you know, you don't know what's a child
25:08
Speaker 1: completely devoid of food? Were they you know that it
25:12
Speaker 1: was mentioned that some of the kids were trying to
25:14
Speaker 1: sneak this child crackers or were they just left to
25:18
Speaker 1: languish over this protracted period of time. That's one of
25:21
Speaker 1: the things. That's one of the reasons I'm thinking, how
25:23
Speaker 1: long had the family actually existed at this dwelling with
25:28
Speaker 1: a deceased child before they even left? You know, how
25:32
Speaker 1: long had that child been dead? So there's a lot
25:35
Speaker 1: of unanswered questions, and I really understand how you can
25:38
Speaker 1: look at a skeleton and determine that the child died
25:42
Speaker 1: of starvation. Another issue here is to doctor William Roney,
25:48
Speaker 1: medical examiner and author of American Narkian, if the child
25:52
Speaker 1: had been deprived of food and was starving, that's one thing.
25:57
Speaker 1: Could you look at the body even a year later
26:00
Speaker 1: and tell if there had been any other cause of
26:02
Speaker 1: death like um asphyxiation or blunt force trauma. You can
26:07
Speaker 1: tell blunt forced trauma through blood coagulation and bruises that
26:13
Speaker 1: collect even in starved and dehydrated tissues. You can tell
26:20
Speaker 1: blunt forced trauma when bruises are matched and overlaying bone fractures.
26:27
Speaker 1: And you have to remember, a very very small, young
26:30
Speaker 1: child like this is not gonna withstand a lot of force.
26:36
Speaker 1: Bones break easy and bleeding bruising and fragile bones breaking,
26:44
Speaker 1: plus the malnutrition is gonna make bones break easy. But
26:49
Speaker 1: Dr Maroney, there's not any tissue. It's just skeleton now,
26:53
Speaker 1: So how can you tell if there was another cod
26:55
Speaker 1: cause of death because bruises under the skin will last.
27:00
Speaker 1: There's blood flow until that child dies. There's blood flow,
27:06
Speaker 1: and it's the lack of nutrition that leads to starvation
27:11
Speaker 1: and the autodigestion muscles are consumed to make energy for
27:18
Speaker 1: the heart to beat and for the lungs to breathe.
27:23
Speaker 1: But there's still some kind of muscle structure there. It's
27:27
Speaker 1: just not developed, and that will bruise and bones will break,
27:32
Speaker 1: and that's what you look for. Whole body autopsies and skin,
27:38
Speaker 1: skin and organs are going to be removed and sliced
27:42
Speaker 1: and examined under microscale. Again again, there are no organs.
27:50
Speaker 1: He's completely skeletonized. There's no muscle, there's no blood, there's
27:56
Speaker 1: no skin, there's no organs. It's a skeleton. That's all
27:59
Speaker 1: there is. Crime stories with Nancy Grace, we moved to
28:20
Speaker 1: a murder case that ended with a verdict of guilty.
28:24
Speaker 1: A jury convicted a Tucson mother who starved her son
28:28
Speaker 1: to death and then hid his body in a toy box.
28:31
Speaker 1: Prosecutor said, Raquel bared Us didn't allow her son Roman
28:35
Speaker 1: to play or talk to anyone. A jurors took less
28:39
Speaker 1: than three hours to convict her. But at Us will
28:42
Speaker 1: be sentenced on July twenty second. The boy's father, Martin,
28:45
Speaker 1: faces first degree murder when his trial starts in August.
28:49
Speaker 1: You're hearing our friends at kgU in TV describing a
28:54
Speaker 1: jury handing down a guilty verdict on mommy. I don't
28:58
Speaker 1: understand why not daddy too? John Limley, Crime online dot
29:02
Speaker 1: Com investigative reporter. I think they should both do life
29:06
Speaker 1: behind bars without parole, if not the death penalty as
29:09
Speaker 1: a pit stop on the way to hell. But why
29:11
Speaker 1: was Mommy isolated and tried? First? Tell me about the trial?
29:15
Speaker 1: The trial centered on the mom, Riquel because of interviews
29:21
Speaker 1: that police had done with members of the entire family
29:26
Speaker 1: and including the kids, who would testify that their mom
29:31
Speaker 1: was the one that was withholding food, making this child
29:36
Speaker 1: stay in this attached structure over time. They mentioned that
29:41
Speaker 1: the dad would would try to talk her out of
29:46
Speaker 1: some of this abuse, try to reason with her, and
29:50
Speaker 1: that she would have none of it. And even the kids,
29:54
Speaker 1: as it's been mentioned, over time, they were even trying
29:58
Speaker 1: to help the child on their own. Some of these kids,
30:01
Speaker 1: you know, less than twelve years old, sneaking food and
30:05
Speaker 1: they could easily tell that the child was not well,
30:09
Speaker 1: that he was really struggling. Take a listen to Ricky
30:14
Speaker 1: Mitchell at wgu NTV. According to the interim complaint filed
30:18
Speaker 1: against Raquel Breeds by a Tucson police officer. When officers
30:22
Speaker 1: arrived at the home, the children told police their mother
30:25
Speaker 1: starved child until death and put child in toy chest
30:29
Speaker 1: in backyard. The report says Raquel but Edes denied any involvement.
30:34
Speaker 1: The officer continued by writing that the nineteen year old
30:37
Speaker 1: daughter stated Raquel responsible, although did not state how, but
30:41
Speaker 1: new child was in backyard. A similar account was written
30:45
Speaker 1: in the interim complaint filed against Martin Butts. The officer
30:49
Speaker 1: wrote that Martin admitted to confronting Raquel about her actions,
30:53
Speaker 1: but did nothing further to stop her from starving child.
30:56
Speaker 1: You were hearing the description in the interim complaint right now.
31:00
Speaker 1: We know that the mom has been convicted, the dad
31:05
Speaker 1: is awaiting trial. I just think it's so lame. Karen
31:11
Speaker 1: start to say, the mom did it on her own.
31:15
Speaker 1: The dad was right there, and this was not by
31:20
Speaker 1: accident or just neglect. They intentionally sequestered the child away
31:24
Speaker 1: from other people, would not let him go to day
31:28
Speaker 1: school or play school, so other people would not know
31:33
Speaker 1: that they were starving and mistreating the child. This was
31:36
Speaker 1: an overt at, not just neglect, and the father is
31:40
Speaker 1: just as responsible. Karen starts, well, I guess you could
31:44
Speaker 1: say that, Nancy. I feel like, yes, he's an adult,
31:48
Speaker 1: he was living there, and certainly he should have spoken
31:51
Speaker 1: up or done something to make us be different. But
31:54
Speaker 1: sometimes it's like Stockholm syndrome, you know, where he begins
31:58
Speaker 1: to not have his own personality, and it does sound
32:02
Speaker 1: very much like brain rushing. So I don't think he's
32:04
Speaker 1: not responsible, but I do think that most of the
32:08
Speaker 1: should absolutely fall on the mother. You know. The reality
32:11
Speaker 1: is a number of Roman's siblings testified against mom at
32:16
Speaker 1: the trial, and they described trying to sneak into the
32:20
Speaker 1: family laundry room to try to give their little brother crackers,
32:24
Speaker 1: and that have to sneak because they were afraid that
32:27
Speaker 1: the mom would then attack them, and the dad would
32:30
Speaker 1: stand by and let it happen. So many times this
32:37
Speaker 1: child slipped through the cracks of the system. As a
32:40
Speaker 1: matter of fact, the Arizona Department of Child Safety removed
32:44
Speaker 1: Roman and three of his older siblings from the parents
32:47
Speaker 1: when he was born because of him being born with
32:51
Speaker 1: drug exposure, but just one year later he was back
32:56
Speaker 1: with the family. So the doctor William Roney, how do
33:00
Speaker 1: you tell when a child has been exposed to drugs?
33:04
Speaker 1: At birth. There's a very classic withdrawal that's precipitated right
33:10
Speaker 1: after birth. It starts within hours. Shrill prize, inability to
33:18
Speaker 1: latch to the nipple and breastfeed, discordinated movements, hypertonic body postures,
33:29
Speaker 1: and loose stool and dehydration. All those are the signs
33:38
Speaker 1: and symptoms of neonatal abstinence syndrome during opiate withdrawal from
33:45
Speaker 1: a mother who had substance used disorder with heroin or opiates.
33:48
Speaker 1: You know, I keep thinking about how this child's life
33:51
Speaker 1: could have been saved. What effect Karen Start would his
33:56
Speaker 1: death and his treatment have on his brothers and sisters
34:00
Speaker 1: who saw it all happen. They're traumatized. I have no doubt, Nancy,
34:05
Speaker 1: that they have to live with this and feel guilty.
34:08
Speaker 1: Especially when you're a kid, you don't know the difference
34:11
Speaker 1: between somebody else making something happen in you. You feel
34:15
Speaker 1: you do everything that you have the ability to stop it,
34:19
Speaker 1: that you make it happen. And so they are going
34:21
Speaker 1: to live a tremendous guilt and just knowing think about this,
34:27
Speaker 1: that their own mother is a murderer and murdered their brother,
34:31
Speaker 1: and that they stood by. There was nothing they could do.
34:34
Speaker 1: It's just a horrific story, a terrible, terrible story, you know.
34:38
Speaker 1: I imagine them going through life feeling as if it
34:40
Speaker 1: were their fault, it was their fault, feeling like they
34:43
Speaker 1: could have saved their brother as they get older. But
34:46
Speaker 1: the reality is they're just children themselves. They don't know
34:50
Speaker 1: that they're going to have a lifetime of suffering knowing
34:55
Speaker 1: this happened under their roof. There are four other children,
34:59
Speaker 1: twelve year old, three daughters ages four, seven, and nineteen.
35:05
Speaker 1: I don't understand why they're in good health and this
35:09
Speaker 1: one is singled out to be tortured for his entire life.
35:16
Speaker 1: What will happen now, Kenyan Johnson as the father goes
35:19
Speaker 1: to trial, Well, so everything that had come out about
35:24
Speaker 1: this case will focus on what did the father know,
35:27
Speaker 1: what would the red flags? Did the father participate in
35:31
Speaker 1: any of the abuse, and did he have the opportunity
35:34
Speaker 1: to stop it? So the jerry is going to be
35:36
Speaker 1: looking at the father's own culpability and also in light
35:41
Speaker 1: of what the mother did, what could he have done
35:44
Speaker 1: and did he make the situation worse or did he
35:47
Speaker 1: try to help? And so death what jerrys are going
35:50
Speaker 1: to try to decide on whether he should be held
35:52
Speaker 1: responsible for in part or in hold for this child's murder.
35:57
Speaker 1: What are signs to look for? How can we stop
36:00
Speaker 1: this from happening again? Karen start joining us out of Manhattan.
36:06
Speaker 1: What signs can we look for in other families? Well,
36:10
Speaker 1: when a family realizes that there's a child that they
36:14
Speaker 1: haven't met, and the family keeps moving for a place
36:18
Speaker 1: to place, that the kids are in school sometimes and
36:22
Speaker 1: sometimes not in school, you have to look for abuses.
36:25
Speaker 1: This is all child abuse, and teachers now are being
36:29
Speaker 1: taught to be aware. You really, it's the frequent absences
36:33
Speaker 1: or not turning up at all, all the moving, the
36:38
Speaker 1: no one knew this child, and so that's the kind
36:41
Speaker 1: of thing that you have to pay attention to and
36:43
Speaker 1: report immediately. And where all now are being taught at
36:48
Speaker 1: over and over again what to look for and Arizona
36:52
Speaker 1: mother accused of starving her three year old little boy
36:55
Speaker 1: dead and putting his body in a toy box has
36:58
Speaker 1: been found guilty of first degree murder and child abuse.
37:04
Speaker 1: This mom allowed no one to play with, talk to,
37:08
Speaker 1: or feed the boy. She created a torture chamber for
37:13
Speaker 1: this little boy. The defense says it's everyone else's fault.
37:19
Speaker 1: A jury disagreed. We wait as justice unfolds and for
37:25
Speaker 1: the father, Martin Barreras, to meet up with Lady Justice.
37:32
Speaker 1: Nancy Grace Crime Story signing off goodbye friend,