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Prosecuting Dad when Mommy kills

I couldn't disagree more with columnist Jacquielynn Floyd at the Dallas News, who finds praiseworthy a 10-year sentence for a father whose wife killed her child in an episode of postpartum psychosis. She thinks:there's a moral equilibrium, a sort of righting of the ship, that comes with judicial recognition that a father who leaves his child with a psychotically sick wife is guilty of more than just bad luck.The sad case of baby Alex marks what may be the first-ever successful prosecution of a dad after a mentally ill mother kills her child. Maxon's wife, Valeria, drowned the 1-year-old in a backyard hot tub at the family's Mansfield house in 2006. Maxon had left to run household errands."You left a defenseless child alone with your wife," state District Judge Wayne Salvant told the defendant, who was clearly stunned by the 10-year sentence...continue to full post

Full post as published by Grits for Breakfast on April 04, 2010 (boomark / email).