Hot Cars Kill Unwanted Adopted Children

Mary Parks and her husband, Jeff, had everything they wanted: a comfortable house in Blacksburg, Virginia; well-paying jobs (Parks was an accountant, Jeff a research scientist); and two darling boys adopted as babies from Guatemala. The end of August and start of September 2007 had been stressful, though. Twenty-three-month-old Juan and his 4-year-old brother, Byron, had both been sick on and off. Parks' days had been blurs of work, day care, doctors, business trips, visits with relatives, and anxiety. On September 7, after attending to a feverish Byron the night before, she left him home to recuperate with Jeff. Her plan was to drive Juan to day care on her way to work.
Rarely had Parks taken just one boy to day care. Rarely had she gone to work at all if one boy was sick -- but this time she and Jeff agreed to swap roles. Moments after she started driving, Parks says, she realized Juan had fallen asleep. It was the last time that morning that she would remember he was in the car. "We were no longer taking anything of his to day care -- we were beyond diaper bags," she says. So there was no baby gear in the front seat to remind her. She caught no glimpse of him in the rearview mirror, either; in his car seat, Juan was too short to spot easily. Most important, perhaps, Byron wasn't there, chattering away. "He never fell asleep in the car," Parks explains.

Instead of stopping at the day care center, she drove right to work. Parks grabbed her purse from the front seat, went into her office, and had "a normal day." Talked with her supervisor. Ate lunch at her desk. Called Jeff to see how Byron was doing. She even remembers telling colleagues that -- since Juan had been sick, too -- she might have to leave early if a call came from day care to get him. In her mind, that's exactly where he was.
After work, Parks drove to the supermarket, shopped for dinner, and continued on to the day care center to pick Juan up -- unaware that he was already sitting right behind her. When she arrived, his teacher asked, "Was Juan out sick today?"
"No," said Parks. "I brought him this morning."
"He wasn't here today," the teacher said.
Within moments, Parks recalls, "a light in my head went on. I took off running toward the car. My heart was already in my feet because I knew how hot it had been that day. I got to the car, jerked open the door, and saw him. I reached over to him. I remember screaming at him, 'Juan! Juan! You've got to wake up!'" Cradling her son's body -- stiff and still as a baby doll's -- Parks ran inside the day care office. One staffer tried desperately to revive Juan with CPR; another called 911. "I went in crying for help," Parks says, "but I knew he was dead."

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Moscow has banned three international adoption agencies after a young Russian boy died in the U.S. Two-year-old Dmitry Yakovlev died when his new father left him in a car in hot sun for several hours. The temperature inside the vehicle had reached 50C.
The case has again raised questions in Russia over the already disputed issue of foreign adoption.
On Tuesday, adoptive father Miles Harrison left the child in a car in a car-park while he disappeared for much of the day. With the temperature outside reaching at least 30C, it became stiflingly hot inside the locked car and the boy died.
Harrison was taken to a medical facility in shock and later taken into custody. On Wednesday he was charged with manslaughter and could face up to ten years in prison.
In recent years, there have been more than ten cases of Russian adopted children dying from parental negligence or abuse in the U.S. alone. Following this death three agencies have been banned from operating in Russia.

Mass murder James Holmes is adopted

The Joker isn’t laughing anymore.
Demented “Batman” massacre suspect James Holmes looked scared, bug-eyed, and completely spaced out beneath his bizarre, Joker-inspired mop of red curls at his first court appearance yesterday.
“You’re not such a tough guy now!” seethed Tom Teves, who lost his 24-year-old son, Alex, in last week’s Colorado massacre, allegedly at the hands of Holmes.

The sickened Teves watched Holmes from a front-row seat in the courtroom — furious that he has shown no remorse.
David Sanchez, whose daughter Katie Medely, 21, was in a hospital about to give birth as her wounded husband, Caleb, 23, fought for his life after being shot in the head at the Aurora theater, spat, “He looks demonic. There’s something wrong with that man.”
Holmes, 24, didn’t speak during his 10-minute appearance in the Arapahoe County courthouse.
As prosecutors said they were still determining the charges to bring — in what could be a death-penalty case — he stared either straight ahead or into his lap with a look of apprehension.
But his eyes popped out and he appeared shocked when the judge told him he was facing murder charges.
A father of one of the dead victims told The Post that cops revealed to him that Holmes was adopted. Police said the San Diego-area couple who raised him are not cooperating in the probe.

“They’re not talking to us right now,” Aurora Police Chief Daniel Oates told ABC News of Robert and Arlene Holmes, 61 and 58.
Holmes’ family lawyer, Lisa Damiani, yesterday said the couple’s “hearts go out to the victims and their families.”
She refused to answer questions about Holmes and his relationship with his family. But when asked whether his parents stand by him, Damiani told reporters in San Diego, “Yes, they do. He’s their son.”
Clad in a prison-issued maroon V-neck top over a bulletproof vest, red pants, white socks and sandals, Holmes was shielded from courtroom glares by one of his public defenders, who was assigned from the division that specifically handles capital-punishment cases.

Wounded victim McKayla Hicks, 17, was also in court. She had been sitting in the theater next door to the shootings when she was hit in the chin by a bullet that went through the wall.
“Once he walked into the [court]room, it just made everything a lot harder,” she told CNN. “He just looks like a pathetic freak. I just want him put away forever.”

Teves sneered, “Alex could have wiped the floor with him without breaking a sweat.” He added, as if addressing Holmes, “You shot a 6-year-old. Come on, give me a break. You’re dressed in full combat gear [and] immediately surrender. Come on. Pick on some guys who know how to use guns.”
It’s still unclear why Holmes snapped that night.
He had painted his body and hair red before donning military gear and shooting up the theater, killing 12 and wounding 58, paralyzing some for life.
Before he left his apartment, he booby-trapped it to kill cops when they got there to investigate the loud music he had set to a timer, hoping the diversion would let him escape after he shot up the theater.

The massacre occurred during a midnight premiere of Batman’s “The Dark Knight Rises” — and he told cops he was the “Joker.”
Agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms yesterday were probing how he assembled his fearsome arsenal of guns — including an AR-15 military-style assault rifle.
TMZ.com said the loveless sicko had been spurned by three women on an online sex site since July 5. And he was about to get booted from his campus housing because he had dropped out of the University of Colorado.
A disgusted jail worker who served Holmes breakfast and lunch just hours after the massacre told The Post that the fiend didn’t lose any sleep — or his appetite — over what he’d just allegedly done.
The worker said Holmes wolfed down Frosted Flakes, a carton of milk and a blueberry muffin for breakfast, then slept like a baby.
“I’m thinking this just happened after midnight, and at 11 a.m., he’s taking a nap? I’m thinking, ‘Wake your ass up, dummy,’ ” he said.
Ian Sullivan, father of the youngest victim, 6-year-old Veronica Moser Sullivan, called Holmes a terrorist and said he should be prosecuted by the feds.
“We just enacted a bill that says if someone acts as a terrorist, he will be treated as such . . . Everything the president, the police, the FBI have said describe him as such,” the grieving dad said.
When Holmes opened fire, Allie Young, 19, was shot in the neck and started spurting blood in the theater, but best pal Stephanie Davies, 21, dragged her out of the carnage and applied pressure to the wound until help arrived.
“I saw Allie get hit and wasn’t going to have my best friend bleed to death in my arms,” Davies told The Post yesterday — a day after both met President Obama at Young’s hospital bedside.
Holmes, a brilliant but painfully shy loner, had been pursuing a doctorate in neuroscience at UC’s Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora before suddenly dropping out in June.

He had been given a $26,000 stipend from the National Institutes of Health, and investigators want to know if any of that cash went to purchase guns or explosives.

July 12, child locked in chicken coop

BUTLER, Ga. (AP) - A Georgia girl told investigators she spent days at a time locked inside a small outhouse and a chicken coop, and had to wear a shock collar because she didn't do her school work, authorities said Thursday.
The 15-year-old girl's parents, Samuel and Diana Franklin, were arrested earlier this week on multiple counts of child cruelty and false imprisonment. They were released on bond, and declined to comment as they left the courthouse Thursday for what appeared to be a custody hearing.
"I've never seen anything like this personally," said Special Agent Wayne Smith of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. "If the allegations prove to be true, it's a very severe case."
The girl was adopted around 2007 and home-schooled in a house outside the small town of Butler, about 85 miles south of Atlanta, according to Smith. The Franklins live on a rural stretch of road sprinkled with a few homes and cow pastures.
The house is surrounded by a split-rail fence with prominent "no trespassing" signs at the entrance of the driveway.
The girl told investigators she spent up to six days at a time in the small buildings in the back of the property as punishment for such things as failing to complete her school assignments, Smith said. She said she had been put in the buildings for at least the past two years.
The outhouse was about 4 feet in length and width, and just a few feet high, Smith said.
"It was just big enough to sit in," Smith said.
The red chicken coop was much larger than the outhouse and chickens were being kept there Thursday.
The girl "might come out during the day a little bit, come in and shower," Smith said.
A neighbor refused to speak with an Associated Press reporter and told him to leave the property.
The investigation began May 25, when child welfare agents, acting on a tip, visited the home with the sheriff's department. That same day, Juvenile Court Judge Wayne Jernigan Sr. ordered the teen removed from the home.
Smith said he believed the Franklins were in court Thursday for a custody hearing. He was not aware of the outcome, and court officials refused to answer questions about the hearing.
On Tuesday, when the parents were taken into custody, investigators found a dog collar on a table in the home, Smith said. The girl told investigators its shock function was operated by a radio signal with a device similar to those used to lock and unlock cars remotely. It was being examined at a crime lab.
The girl lived at the home with another sibling, while two other siblings are older and lived away from home. The charges involve only the 15-year-old girl, Smith said, and there are no allegations of abuse involving the other three children.
A spokeswoman for the state Department of Family and Children's Services said state law prevented her from answering questions about the case.
After the girl was removed from the house, Smith said she began to open up to investigators.
"Kind of what has happened is within a few hours of being taken out of that environment, a lot of this began to flow very freely," Smith said. "You almost have to remove the person from the threat of punishment before they begin to open up to you. That's normal, and that's what has happened here."
___
Martin reported from Atlanta

Man arrested for brutally killing father and grandmother

Investigators have discovered that a man arrested for brutally killing his father and grandmother was adopted by his victims.
Dwayne Flourney, 26, allegedly stabbed Sandra Flourney, 76, and his father Brian 52, to death before hiding their bodies in the home and throwing a party on March 10.
Three weeks after the double-murder, it has now been revealed that unbeknown to Flourney he was taken in by Brian and Sandra after being abandoned by his biological mother over 20 years ago.  
According to a court document obtained by The Star-Ledger and a series of interviews with relatives and law enforcement officials, the victims raised Flourney as their own and he always believed Brian was his blood father.
Flourney allegedly stabbed his grandmother Sandra repeatedly before stuffing her body in the trunk of a car parked in the garage at the family's home in Maplewood, New Jersey.
He then waited for his father to return from work, killed him in the same way and put his body in a chair on the back porch covered with pillows, blankets and a plastic bag over the head, according to the police report.
The alleged killer then cleaned up the crime scene before inviting friends around for a party, where he played drinking games just a few feet from his father's body, reports The Star-Ledger.
He pushed a table in front of the door to the sun porch to keep his guests from discovering it, officials told the newspaper.

After the killings, Newark residents Linda Smith, 52, and Cornelius Morton, 58, revealed that they are Flourney's biological parents.
They say he was placed into the custody of Smith’s sister, Jaclyn, as a young child. Jaclyn was Brian’s girlfriend at the time.
It is not yet clear how Flourney ended up to be in Brian and Sandra's care and Jaclyn Smith has refused to comment, reports the Star Ledger.
'My son ain’t had no right to do that to him, or his mother,' said Linda Smith, referring to the two victims.
Flourney’s attorney, Bukie Adetula, confirmed that he had never met his biological mother, but knew that her name was Linda or Lynn. He added that his client always believed that Brian was his father, and knew nothing about Morton

Christian parents spank adopted daughter to death

Kevin and Elizabeth Shatz won’t be winning any Parent of the Year awards anytime soon. These two monsters in sheep’s clothing spanked and beat their adopted 7-year-old daughter Lydia for seven hours, to her death. Lydia’s injuries, a type of tissue damage, were so severe that they appeared consistent with those of victims of earthquakes and bombings.
It all went down for in the family’s Paradise, California home.
The Shatz practiced a barbaric parenting technique on the rise within Christian Fundamentalist families, which teaches that in order to raise happy, well-adjusted children, it’s necessary to beat them. Often. The basic premise,”To spare the rod will spoil your child,” says it all. (And by “all”, we mean that these parents are just awful.)

Galen Stevenson accused of murdering father

George Stevenson grew up in a family that cared for numerous foster children, and after mentoring and coaching boys in youth baseball for years, he decided to adopt a child of his own.

He became the father of an 8-year-old boy and named him Galen, after his brother. As the boy grew older, relatives say, it became apparent that he was troubled, and at one point he had to be sent away to a treatment facility.

Still, they say, none of that could have foretold what happened in late April, when police say Galen stabbed his 43-year-old father repeatedly inside their North Baltimore apartment. George Stevenson died of his injuries, including a punctured lung and severed kidney, this month, and the boy has been charged as an adult in the attack. Galen is 16 now.

George Stevenson's relatives continue to stress, even in the face of his death, that foster care and adoption are important and positive experiences, and they are speaking out to ensure that public perceptions of the institutions aren't tainted by this case. They also still want the best for Galen, calling the killing "an isolated incident."

"We don't want people to think it has anything to do with adoption or kids in the foster care system. That's not the case," said George Stevenson's sister, Rashelle Stevenson-Oliver, who has seven adopted children. "It's an isolated incident, and we hope things work out so that he can get the attention and the help that he needs."

Galen's defense attorney, Elizabeth Lopez, said the allegations were out of character for the teenager. Lopez said one of the boy's teachers told her that he played chess with her every day and was a "great student." Lopez declined to comment further.

Boy 15 admits to killing adopted parents

An adopted teenager was charged with two counts of murder today after police found the bodies of his parents stashed under a blanket inside the family car.
Moses Kamin, 15, appeared in court and was charged as an adult over the deaths of his parents, two highly-educated civil servants, last week.  
Police went to the house twice on Friday to check on Robert Kamin, 55, and Susan Poff, 50, after their employers reported that they didn't show up for work.
After discovering the couple dead, police questioned their son who later confessed to strangling his parents in Oakland, California.

Police have not revealed why Moses allegedly murdered his parents but there have been suggestions the boy was suffering from depression and having problems at a new school.

Colleagues of the couple also told the San Francisco Chronicle that the couple had been having problems with their son, who they believed was spending too much time in the Occupy Oakland camp.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported he was adopted within the last ten years.