Thread: Dreams dashed in toddler's death

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Dreams dashed in Stuart toddler's death

Nellier Lima STANTON M. PADDOCK
stanton.paddock@scripps.com



By GABRIEL MARGASAK
gabriel.margasak@scripps.com
August 12, 2006
STUART — Wilson Filho dreamed those dreams that fathers do and, in his, little Harold would grow up to be a Brazilian soccer star.
At 21 months old, the energetic toddler loved playing the world's game outside the family home in working-class Golden Gate, bordering a dirt lot perfect for kicking the ball around.


But this father's hopes were snatched away Thursday when his son was found dead in the family truck, and his wife was charged with aggravated manslaughter for allegedly forgetting the boy in his car seat for eight hours as she cleaned houses and ran errands, Stuart police said.
"He was the best little boy I ever met in my life. He was the best little boy ever made," the sobbing father said from his home Friday. "I knew if he lived he would have made me very proud of him."

The loss of Harold shrouded in tragedy the criminal case against mom Nellier "Nelly" Lima, 26, who was held Friday in the Martin County jail without bail. Prosecutors can proceed in several directions after reviewing the evidence in the coming days: officially file the charge as is, upgrade to a tougher charge, reduce the charge or drop the case.

The current charge is punishable by a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison.

"I need the most support right now for my wife. She's in jail. I don't know what's going to turn out (for) her," said Filho, whose family remains in Brazil. "It's a tragic accident and a tragic loss. We love our kids dearly. And whatever happened, it was a tragedy. It was nothing masterminded and nothing wrong (done by) her."

Lima told police she was supposed to drop Harold at day care before taking her daughter Jessica, 6, to Port Salerno Elementary School. But the boy was sleeping soundly and she decided drop him off later to avoid waking him. Out of her routine, she then forgot the boy in his car seat and went to work, authorities said.

Lima went about her business cleaning houses and went shopping at the Dollar General store on East Ocean Boulevard shortly after 3 p.m.

She was putting her purchases in the Ford F-150 truck at 4:14 p.m. when she realized Harold was still there.

"Oh my God! It's my fault! It's my fault," Lima wailed in the background of a 911 call as store worker Jami Hall, 28, tried in vain to perform CPR.

On Friday, Hall placed a blue teddy bear and flowers next to a box for donations outside the Dollar General to help pay for funeral expenses.

"My heart does go out to her family...," she said. "This is least I can do to help them."

One woman in hospital scrubs dropped a $10 bill in the box, which is scheduled to be in front of the store in Cedar Pointe Plaza again today. Hall said she plans to take the money to police after the weekend so they can give the donations to the family.

Detectives still were piecing together the case, trying to figure out details such as the mother's residency status and how she could have forgotten her baby.

"This is not an open-and-shut case. There's new leads that are popping up right now," said Detective Michael Gerwan, 35.

Gerwan said he was calling the Brazilian embassy for help on Lima's immigration status. The family told police the boy's father is a legal U.S. resident but his wife had yet to get her official papers.

While many in the community expressed outrage at the mother, those who know Lima said the charge against her is completely unrepresentative of how she cared for little Harold.

"Hasn't she been punished enough? She just lost her baby," said Palm City resident Jan Dalcorso, 55, who has rented her Golden Gate home to the couple for about a year.

"Nellier has always been a wonderful mother. If she couldn't find a job that allowed her to be with her kids, she didn't take it. Her life revolves around those kids ...

"This is just a horrible accident. People shouldn't be judging her," she said. "They should be saying prayers that she can get through this."

Back on Ellendale Street at a house now in mourning, the father could barely speak between quiet sobs and memories of his boy.

"He was one of the healthiest boys. He was a very smart kid. He loved playing soccer," Filho, 42, said. "It's just tearing me apart."

http://tinyurl.com/q2wbs

Woman who left son in truck held on manslaughter charge
By Jill Taylor, Daphne Duret

Palm Beach Post Staff Writers

Saturday, August 12, 2006

STUART — A Golden Gate mother whose 21-month-old son was found dead after being left in her truck all day Thursday was held without bail at the Martin County jail Friday on a charge of aggravated manslaughter.

The charge, based on an allegation of negligence in the care of a child, carries a possible 30-year prison term.



Nellier Lima, 26, told Stuart detectives she forgot her son, Harold, was in his car seat in the rear passenger compartment of her four-door Ford F-150 pickup after she dropped her 6-year-old daughter, Jessica, at Port Salerno Elementary School about 8 a.m. Thursday.

She normally dropped Harold at day care while she worked cleaning houses during the day, but on Thursday, she didn't realize he was still in the car until she stopped at Dollar General at Cedar Pointe Plaza and went to load her purchases in the back.

Frantic store clerk Jami Hall called 911 after Lima ran in crying that her baby was not breathing.

Martin County dispatchers went through the steps to instruct Hall in CPR over the phone until Hall told them the mother said the baby was in the truck all day and that his body was stiff and blistered.

"He... he's dead," Hall said quietly into the phone as Lima screamed and cried in the background of the 4:15 p.m. call.

Associate Medical Examiner Charles Diggs performed an autopsy Friday morning, but will wait for toxicology results to issue his final report.

Investigator Harry Browning said there was no sign the child had been beaten and nothing to indicate he had any serious medical problems. There was nothing to contradict a finding that the heat in the closed truck killed him, but Diggs wants to see the test results first, he said.

A California meteorologist who has done extensive research and is quoted in federal reports on heat-related child deaths said it's likely Harold died within 15 minutes of being left alone in the truck in the 90-degree heat Stuart experienced Thursday. The temperature in the truck would have reached a more-than-lethal 109 degrees in about 10 minutes, he said.

"When the body temperature reaches 104, that's heat stroke. At 107 degrees, organs start shutting down," Jan Null said Friday.

Assistant State Attorney Nita Denton on Friday said her office will review the facts of the case before they formally press charges against Lima.

Of all the cases prosecutors work, Denton said, charges involving the death of a child take the greatest emotional toll on everyone involved.

"I think it's hard on everyone because a baby is so defenseless," she said. "It's the kind of thing I've seen grown men break down and cry over."

Lima lives with her husband, Wilson Filho, 42, at a triplex on Ellendale Street south of Stuart. She has no criminal record in Martin County and her family was not under any supervision from the state Department of Children and Families, but she did have a prior arrest on a misdemeanor child neglect charge in Broward County in 2004.

When Harold was 3 weeks old, she was issued a notice to appear in court after Coconut Creek police found Jessica, then age 4, near an intersection with no adults around, according to court records.

Officers took Jessica home and wrote on the court notice, "The residence of the child is in poor condition with multiple hazards to the children."

She pleaded no contest and was ordered to pay $226 in fees and costs. DCF records on such cases are not public, but it would not be unusual for the state to offer or require parenting classes and other services for a family in that situation.

Filho, who has also gone by the last name Souza, was arrested in March after Martin deputies were called to the family's apartment on a domestic violence complaint.

Lima told deputies her husband had hit her in the face several times during an argument, according to records. Filho was arrested that night and charged with domestic battery.

Records show he pleaded no contest to the charge in April and was sentenced to 12 months probation. In a questionnaire Lima filled out after her husband's arrest, she said he had assaulted her before.

News of Lima's arrest further saddened the family's already devastated neighbors in the Golden Gate community. Andrea Wilkins left a hot dinner untouched Thursday night after she heard about the boy's death.

On Friday, she watched TV reports and saved newspaper clippings about his death. Despite Lima's arrest, Wilkins said, she thought both parents treated Harold well.

The last time she saw the boy, he was outside playing with his father, rolling along in a Spider-Man scooter the couple bought him two weeks ago.

"This whole thing is just sad," she said.

Jami Hall went back to work Friday at the Dollar General on East Ocean Boulevard, the memory of little Harold still on her mind.

Hall said Lima refused to pick up the baby after they realized he was dead, so she held him in her arms at the store until police arrived.

"When the police got here, that's when she wanted him back," she said.

Hall, a mother of five who is also raising a stepson, has mixed emotions about Lima's arrest. By Friday afternoon, she felt the police did the right thing.

The clerk and a friend have started a memorial fund to help pay for Harold's funeral. The clerk's bosses at Dollar General have allowed her to set up a donation box near her cash register. In the meantime, Hall said she is still having trouble coping with the boy's death.

"I think today is worse than yesterday."