Child Injury Lawyer Blog
By Robert Fernicola, Attorney, Steven Smith, Attorney, and David Wolf, Attorney
Published by Child Injury Lawyer Network
Kristal Khan, a babysitter from Queens, New York, ran an unlicensed day care center out of her home. She is accused of becoming extremely drowsy and falling asleep after drinking NyQuil cold medicine while babysitting 11-month-old James Farrior III on June 15, 2009. James allegedly fell head first into a mop bucket full of water and drowned. Kahn is accused of not waking up because she was in a cold medicine-induced sleep when James fell into the bucket full of water in Kahn’s Richmond Hill home. Kahn is being tried on reckless assault charges and could face up to four years in prison if convicted. More troubling is Kahn’s emotional state or, better put, lack thereof. Prosecutor Leigh Bishop stated the state will produce witnesses, firefighters and police who will testify that Kahn was “calm and without emotion” in her statements after the incident. NYPD Detective Brian Simonsen testified that Kahn showed no emotion was neither sad nor frantic when she gave her written statement a mere 2 hours after the death. For more details on this case and to see a video of Kahn please see Drowsy babysitter case of Queens, New York goes to trial.
In Morganza, Louisiana, a family lost a son who was the unfortunate victim of a dog mauling by the neighbor’s three Boxer breed dogs. The small town / village of just over 600 people mourned this little boy’s death. In the aftermath of his death, the family along with a blogger (Holly Lemoine) launched a campaign and website called 
A Minnesota mother is demanding answers after her sun ran out of 2 day care centers, two days in a row. The incidents occurred on November 4 and 5, 2010. Two-year-old Ryker Hacker walked right out the front doors two separate Southern Minnesota day care centers. Jackie Downing, Ryker’s mother, said she was referred to day care provider Rosemary Marquette from her neighbor. On Ryker’s first day, Marquette said she briefly turned her back to help another child when Ryker suddenly went wandered off. Marquette said she did what any other parent or adult would do and started searching form him on her own. However, police say they did not receiving a call from Marquette reporting the child missing. In fact, police received calls from concerned citizens after they saw Ryker in the middle of a busy street, 45 minutes after the child went missing. After much persistence, Downing successful in charging Marquette with a criminal misdemeanor charge of child neglect. The second incident occurred the very next day at Caring Arms day care facility in Nicollet, Minnesota. Sonja Shay, director at Caring Arms, says the center called police and found Ryker walking towards his home a short time after he went missing. To read more on this story please see 
According to authorities, seven middle school students in San Francisco, California, were taken to the hospital after they ingested rat poison, which they mistakenly took for candy. The incident occurred at Martin Luther King Jr. Academic Middle school. A student told a parent about ingesting a blue cube found atop of filing a cabinet. A teacher later contacted poison control. Although the students showed no symptoms, they were taken to the hospitals for precautionary reasons. School officials say the incident is under investigation. To read more on this story please see 
The Archdiocese of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, publicly stated it would filed for bankruptcy in the midst of pending child abuse lawsuits. According to Archbishop Jerome Listecki, the reason for filing for bankruptcy was because the pending sexual-abuse lawsuits could leave the archdiocese with debts it could not afford. However, one lawyer claims it is a delay tactic being used by the church to avoid opening its records to public scrutiny. In fact, Jeff Anderson, an attorney of St. Paul, Minnesota, who has filed 23 lawsuits against the church, stated he thought the bankruptcy filing was done to delay his deposition of Milwaukee Bishop Richard Sklba. Anderson and his clients have been pushing the archdiocese to make public the names of the priests accused of the sexual child abuse and the church officials who protected them.
Police officials in Baker, California, have arrested a former day are worker in connection with the October 2010 death of a 2-month-old baby at a local day care center. 22-year-old Ashley Rene Reifer was arrested and charged with one count of second-degree murder and one count of cruelty to a juvenile. The autopsy of Brody Hopper revealed that Brody died of traumatic brain injury or Shaken Baby Syndrome, said Police Chief Make Knaps. Reifer worked at Busy Bee Learning Center in Baker, California. According to investigators, Brody was in her sole care on the day of his death.
