Texas toddler dies after siblings put her in oven

[Fantastic Anarchist]

Source: AFP

A toddler left alone with her pre-school siblings in their Texas home suffered fatal burns after they put her in the oven and switched it on, US media reported.

J'Zyra Thompson, 19 months, was left unsupervised along with her three-year-old twin siblings in the Houston apartment. A five-year-old was also present.

Court records obtained by ABC-13 News in Houston said the twins told child protective services that one of them put their little sister in the oven and the other one made it "hot."

Their mother Raqual Thompson, 25, is set to appear in court Monday on four counts of child endangerment, according to the Harris County Sheriff's office.

Thompson reportedly told police that she had gone out with her boyfriend to collect a pizza and a prescription at the drug store when her child burned to death on November 16.

When they returned home they found the three other children crying and pointing to the kitchen. The oven had toppled over with the door face down on the floor.

Read more: http://nr.news-republic.com/Web/ArticleWeb.aspx?regionid=1&articleid=52701114&source=digest&tagid=-3&tagname=Breaking%20News

---

Original Source is AFP. As I understand it, News Republic is a news aggregator. Moderators, if I need to edit, please let me know. Thank you.

[Kalidurga]

1. The oven had toppled over with the door face down on the floor.

Now how did that happen?

[Fantastic Anarchist]

4. That jumped out to me, too.

Have no clue, but I don't think this was intentionally done. I don't think the kids intentionally did it, do you?

[LisaL]

7. They put a kid inside an oven and turned it on.

But at their age they are presumed incapable of committing a crime.

[Helen Borg]

63. Some Republican candidates...

May want to charge them as adults.

[Chemisse]

68. Notice they said a five year old was present too.

Perhaps that child can be charged. At least he would sit still in court!

[cannabis_flower]

94. My assumption..

is that it was a light weight oven. One of the kids turned it on and the 19 month old got on top of the oven door and it toppled on top of him.

[NanceGreggs]

9. I don't hink the kids ...

... could do it, physically. Given how stoves are weighted, it would take enormous effort to get it to "topple" frontwards.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

12. Hmmm, very interesting. Something was amiss, but never thought about an intentional murder angle.

That is a huge hole in the story, I suppose.

[NanceGreggs]

18. I'm not going to "intentional murder" ...

... this early on.

But I cannot fathom how two three-year-old girls could possibly "topple" a stove frontwards. Stoves are weighted to be back-heavy.

[jberryhill]

21. I guess we'd have to know more about the oven to know

Perhaps this was a flimsy oven and an uneven floor. Conditions may not have been safe there.

There is also the question of reaching the knobs, if they are on a back panel.

Perhaps a child had to climb on top to turn it on.

[NanceGreggs]

24. You're right.

I don't know what the conditions here were.

But stoves have always been weighted back-heavy, to compensate for the extra weight that sometimes gets placed on an open oven door. (A Thanksgiving turkey comes to mind for some inexplicable reason).

I just can't imagine how two three-year-olds could "topple" a stove frontwards.

[LisaL]

29. Just by googling I found a number of stories of children being killed when

an oven toppled over on top of them.

[jberryhill]

30. The dynamic forces a child on top could generate

...are considerable.

An energetic child on the top is likely to be able to generate more angular momentum than by loading a heavy object into the front.

Low cost ovens are not like stainless steel behemoths.

[roguevalley]

39. so terrible. those kids ... everyone of them. ARRRGGGGGGGGGGGGH!

I pray for them to be able to grow up okay. Bless the children.

[Reter]

72. Perhaps it was a small stove?

[LisaL]

14. If an adult wanted to bake the kid, they wouldn't need to topple the stove.

[NanceGreggs]

19. What anyone "wanted" ...

... or "needed to do" is not the issue here. The issue is that the idea of a stove being toppled frontwards by two three-year-olds just doesn't hold water.

Where that leads is, at this point, anyone's guess. But it's a feat that is simply not physically possible.

[LisaL]

20. Are you a physics expert?

You are making a statement that something isn't "physically possible" and I would like to know what is your expertise in this matter.

[jberryhill]

22. Did they climb onto it to reach the knobs

Perhaps if the larger child climbed on top and was then climbing off the front, making it unbalanced enough.

[NanceGreggs]

27. I used to stand ...

... on my 35-year-old stove to clean the shelves above it. By necessity, I had to stand at the front of the stove to do so. The stove never even moved.

I am sure I weigh more than two small girls. That's why I just find that scenario not credible.

[jberryhill]

31. It is puzzling

But very limited information.

[LisaL]

33. It happens.

"The 2-year-old was crushed in his family's kitchen here on July 11 when the stove tipped over on him. Safety experts say a simple bracket, required in some jurisdictions, would have saved him."


http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/child-s-death-from-tipping-stove-leads-to-lawsuit/article_149a8b92-86d9-507c-9ad5-d859a4638f97.html

[jberryhill]

79. Well, there you go

[cannabis_flower]

96. Here's another report

http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2010/11/one-year-old-child-killed-when-range-tips-over/index.htm

Seems it is not uncommon.

[pnwmom]

44. Apparently not. This book says a toddler could do it.

https://books.google.com/books?id=-fYDGf4U1psC&pg=PT67&lpg=PT67&dq=running+joke+character+fiction&source=bl&ots=kwyBJicxHO&sig=s5ZWv3xhMXq-WvmMVvgirvlX1MI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjt8f6yqq3JAhVBUYgKHUqtDVUQ6AEISDAI#v=onepage&q=running%20joke%20character%20fiction&f=false


From a book called The Joy of Fatherhood:

“Be sure that anti-tip brackets have been installed on your oven to attach it to the wall. While this may not be a concern yet, once your baby can stand, he could pull the oven over on top of him, resulting in serious injury or even death.

[NanceGreggs]

50. Honestly ...

... I've been Googling.

Until tonight, I had never heard of anti-tip brackets - which seem to be recommended for certain types of stoves. I have never seen one anywhere.

I would imagine they are recommended for very cheap, flimsy appliances - the kind a landlord would buy for tenants in an apartment complex. So it's possible this was the kind of stove in play here.

But I am still curious as to how this could have happened without one of the other children (the one or ones who caused the toppling) being injured by a falling stove.

[pnwmom]

55. We don't know whether any if the others were hurt. The coverage was pretty minimal.

The other thing is, these 3 year olds could have been closer to 4 in age. That much stronger, taller, and able to jump out of the way if they felt a stove about to fall over on them.

The other possibility -- that the parents were involved and the kids were lying -- seems even more far fetched. How could you prep a pair of three year olds and a 5 year old to all tell the same story about this?

[LiberalArkie]

62. Most new ranges do not weight hardly anything and come with the anti-tip bracket that really must

be installed. They are so light that just opening the oven door and having some weight on the door will cause the oven to tilt a little forward. They are made to where when you slide the range up next to the wall one of the back legs will slide under the bracket. However if the range is pulled out from the wall a couple of inches the bracket is not effective.

[Travis_0004]

76. Every 'normal' stove should have one

By normal I mean every stove that sits on the ground. An in wall oven is secured to the wall by design.

Its possible another child only suffered very minor injurues and it didnt make the news.

[forgotmylogin]

49. The oven door was probably open...

My guess what happened - the children had no intention of "baking" their sibling. They were probably playing on the oven. They opened the door to be able to step up and play with the controls, and they left the oven on heating up.

With two small children and a toddler sitting on the open oven door, they could easy have enough leverage to tip the oven. It tilted too far forward, and the two older kids scrambled out as the oven fell, closing on the toddler who was sitting on the door. The kids wouldn't have enough strength to pick the oven back up off the other one.

The question I'd ask these kids is if they were using the oven because they were cold in the house and had possibly seen their parents ever using the open oven as a heater.

[LisaL]

66. From what police report says (in the OP), they admitted one of them

put sister in oven and the other made it hot.

[Chemisse]

69. This really makes much more sense, given that the stove was knocked over.

And what the children 'said' is highly dependant on what the officials asked and how they asked it.

[LisaL]

73. According to the police report, one child

admitted to putting the girl in oven, and the other to turning the oven on. It was also reported that the girl was kicking the door from the inside. It doesn't sound anything like the scenario suggested of them playing under the oven.

[Chemisse]

78. But imagine how they were questioned.

"And then your sister put the baby in the oven?"

Scared nod.

"Did the baby try to get out?"

Sad nod.

"How could you tell? Was she kicking?"

And on and on.

I have little faith that either the police or the social workers knew how to elicit the real story from such small children.

[LisaL]

82. You do realize that this is a complete and baseless speculation on your part?

[Chemisse]

86. Yes it is. So what?

I am expressing skepticism because the story they gave seems unlikely. Why would a toddler put a baby in the oven in the first place? Have your toddlers ever pondered doing such a thing? I know mine have not. And then why knock over the stove?

On the other hand, playing on or near the stove would be very fun for toddlers who want to be like their mom or dad and cook things. Add to that a freak accident whereby the stove falls over and one gets trapped, and it all makes sense without a three year old having such grisly desires.

That's my opinion, and I felt like expressing it. If you don't like it, just pass it by.

[LisaL]

87. Kids can do all kind of things when left unattended.

Whole bunch of stories about young children killing either themselves or other people when they find a gun.
I don't find it hard to believe 3 year old put a sister into an oven.

[Igel]

97. Their story fits.

If an oven with the door open tips forward, the first thing that'll happen is the door will slide forward and the oven door slam closed. At least part of the child's going to be left outside of the oven.

How, exactly, the oven would be turned on with the knobs facing down is another issue. Why it would be on ahead of time is also a question.

Most ovens in Houston, as far as I can tell, use natural gas.

[Travis_0004]

74. They absolutely could

Every stove should be equiped with an anti tip bracket.

Unfortunately most are not.

The danger is if a kid opens the door, then climbs on it, their weight would cause the oven to tip forward if an anti tip bracket is not installed.

[Kalidurga]

36. I don't think so

the oldest is 5. This is just very strange. Maybe the parents did it when they found out the baby was in there and they freaked?

[pnwmom]

47. Part of baby-proofing is securing stoves to walls with anti-tip brackets.

So that part of the story is not so hard to believe.

https://books.google.com/books?id=-fYDGf4U1psC&pg=PT67&lpg=PT67&dq=running+joke+character+fiction&source=bl&ots=kwyBJicxHO&sig=s5ZWv3xhMXq-WvmMVvgirvlX1MI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjt8f6yqq3JAhVBUYgKHUqtDVUQ6AEISDAI#v=onepage&q=running%20joke%20character%20fiction&f=false


From a book called The Joy of Fatherhood:

“Be sure that anti-tip brackets have been installed on your oven to attach it to the wall. While this may not be a concern yet, once your baby can stand, he could pull the oven over on top of him, resulting in serious injury or even death.

[Kalidurga]

52. Okay thanks

I never baby proved my kitchen like that. But, then the babies weren't allowed in there until they were old enough to know to stay away from the stove.

[pnwmom]

53. I didn't know, either. But I knew a lot of things are supposed to be fixed to walls

so I'm not terribly surprised.

Another thing that has killed small children is an unsecured TV screen.

[Kalidurga]

56. Yep I heard about tv screens

mine was in an entertainment center so I didn't worry too much. Still no no baby stay away from that. Yep, I was saying that in my sleep.

You know those things you are supposed to put in outlets? Yeah mine were pulling those out by the time they were two. So, I still had to watch them like a hawk. They also figured out how to get into safety lock cupboards. And car seats were a joke to my middle child. I would put her in and then turn around to find her dancing in the back seat.

[pnwmom]

57. When my son was five

and I was busy nursing his baby brother (who required a quiet, dark room -- that's another story), he defeated the child safety locks in the bathroom cabinet. How? By getting a screwdriver and removing the screws in the hinges that held the door to the frame.

(Fortunately, the child-proof bottle caps were beyond his ability.)

Another afternoon I learned that our dishwasher was held in place by only three screws. Who knew?

[NanceGreggs]

5. My first thought, too.

How is that even possible?

[LisaL]

6. The child inside the oven was kicking the oven door.

[NanceGreggs]

10. Which would have opened the door ...

... but would not have "toppled" an entire stove frontwards.

[LisaL]

15. Well, it did topple the stove.

I don't know why an adult would topple the stove if they wanted to bake the kid.

[pnwmom]

25. Maybe they were desperately trying to get the door open and pulled it down instead.

Remember we are talking about very small people here. At their angle I can see this happening.

[cui bono]

41. They could have had a small stove/oven that small apartments have.

They can be skinny and not very deep and maybe even the small kids could have pulled it over? I don't know, but I have seen very small stoves.

[BlueJazz]

3. Words fail me.

[rusty quoin]

8. Me too.

[jaysunb]

11. me three n/t

[NanceGreggs]

13. From the article posted ...

"Child protective services, quoted by local media, said the couple had failed to alert a grandmother who lived in the same apartment complex that they were leaving the children unsupervised."

Grandma lives right there, but she wasn't asked to sit with the kids, or even check-in on them?
She didn't even get a phone call to say they were being left alone?

[LisaL]

16. Sounds like mother was in a habit of leaving kids unattended.

And she is pregnant yet again.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

17. My sister used to leave my nieces unattended all the time.

But then again, my sister is a sociopath, so she didn't really care for them.

[pnwmom]

26. Forget the grandmother. There were two of them. One should have stayed home. n/t

[NanceGreggs]

32. No, exactly.

One of the adults could easily have run the errands described. There was no need for both to go.

The grandmother lives right there, but no one bothers to tell her the kids are being left alone.

Then two little girls then "topple" a stove frontwards?

[pnwmom]

43. If a couple of three year olds were pulling downwards on a door, from that low height,

could they pull the oven over?

I have no idea.

[NanceGreggs]

46. Me neither.

But given the circumstances cited in the article, it just struck me as odd. And if the two girls were pulling on the oven door, wouldn't they have been pinned under the stove when it toppled? How did they "pull" a stove down without being injured themselves?

I just find it curious.

[pnwmom]

48. It turns out it's not so hard to tip an oven over -- even for a young toddler.

And it's part of baby-proofing to secure ovens to walls.

https://books.google.com/books?id=-fYDGf4U1psC&pg=PT67&lpg=PT67&dq=running+joke+character+fiction&source=bl&ots=kwyBJicxHO&sig=s5ZWv3xhMXq-WvmMVvgirvlX1MI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjt8f6yqq3JAhVBUYgKHUqtDVUQ6AEISDAI#v=onepage&q=running%20joke%20character%20fiction&f=false


From a book called The Joy of Fatherhood:

“Be sure that anti-tip brackets have been installed on your oven to attach it to the wall. While this may not be a concern yet, once your baby can stand, he could pull the oven over on top of him, resulting in serious injury or even death.

[joshcryer]

58. Yeah, the door is very heavy.

The oven proper is insulated with a fiberglass material and a thin sheet of metal for the interior. The door is thick vacuum sealed double pane glass (so that you don't burn your hand if you touch the glass). That requires a thick sealant, rubber, and more fiber insulation in the door.

Learned this the hard way when I moved an oven and tore out the screws in the back (I didn't know it was screwed down) and it fell over on me (I caught it in time, but I can see it happening to a kid easily).

This could be a liability lawsuit here if the investigation determines that it wasn't screwed down.

[pnwmom]

61. It will probably be a lawsuit if the parents aren't put in jail for neglect.

Glad you didn't get hurt.



As I mentioned to someone else here, I learned when my son was 5, and handy with a screwdriver, that my dishwasher was held in place by three screws. The drop was only a few inches, but still. Someone's foot could have gotten squished!

[LisaL]

64. Lawsuit?

Child died because she was put in oven and oven was made "hot" when children were left unattended.

[Quackers]

77. I used to work at Lowes and would sometime deliver and install stoves.

They all came with anti-tip brackets from the manufacturer. We would install them free of charge unless the homeowner told us no. If they said no, they had to sign on our paperwork that they were declining it. The biggest issue is small children will open the oven door and try to climb in. That extra 30 lbs on top and out in front of the oven is enough to make them tip over on their face.

I feel so bad for the kids that have to grow up and live with that memory.

[pnwmom]

85. I do, too. None of the three kids is at fault, but they'll have to live with this forever. nt

[tblue37]

60. That is not what they were doing. From a Daily Mail story:

According to court records prosecutors filed Monday, Thompson told investigators that on the evening of November 16, she had left her four children, including a five-year-old, alone in their apartment for about 30 minutes to pick up Malone from work.

Later that night, Thompson and Malone again left the children alone after putting them to bed to go get some pizza and visit Malone's brother. The couple was gone for about two hours.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3332462/Mother-boyfriend-charged-death-toddler-burned-oven.html#ixzz3saIVpAuG

And I bet that "2-hour visit" was way longer than just two hours.

[restorefreedom]

89. i know, right?

since when does it take two adults to retrieve a pizza and a prescription?

methinks something smells bad.

[Chemisse]

70. Wow. You're right.

Why on earth did they both leave??

[jmowreader]

34. It says "a" grandmother, which doesn't necessarily mean "their" grandmother

[NanceGreggs]

38. Odds are there is more than ...

... one grandmother living in the same apartment complex. So why mention "a grandmother" who wasn't "alerted", if it was meant as a generic term?

[jmowreader]

51. Never worked in the media, I see...

If a woman ever has a child, she will no longer be referred to as "a (insert age) woman" but "a (insert age) mother of (number of children)." If one of those children ever has children, the original woman will be "a grandmother" until she dies. Some papers and TV stations call men with children "fathers" instead of "men," but all papers call childed women "mothers."

[cui bono]

42. Even without grandma, does it take two adults to pick up pizza and medicine?

Idiots. Poor children.

[jberryhill]

23. Horrifying

[pnwmom]

28. Another piece from a British tabloid.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3332462/Mother-boyfriend-charged-death-toddler-burned-oven.html

[840high]

35. Precious baby. Parents with no sense.

[LuvNewcastle]

37. I don't know about this story.

Seems like it should involve a babysitter, a microwave, and LSD.

[pnwmom]

40. The father of the 3 year olds supposedly wants them. And he says

he doesn't know whether he's the father of the dead baby or not -- but she was a "cute little baby."

What kind of father would stay away from his toddlers for this length of time? And not find out for sure if the baby was his?

All of the adults in this situation failed the kids miserably.

http://abc13.com/news/dad-looking-for-kids-left-home-alone-when-toddler-died/1091992/

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- Fredrick Price came to the apartment complex on Sterlingshire looking for his two kids Thursday morning, both three years old. When Eyewitness News first talked to him, he had no idea they were among the children left alone in unit 115 Monday night. That's where 19-month-old J'Zyra Thompson died after being placed in an oven.

"I need to know where they are, I haven't heard from my children in months," said Price. " I've been trying to contact Racquel."

Price is the ex-boyfriend of Racquel Thompson. Police believe she left her four kids, all under five years old, home alone Monday night. That's when little J'Zyra, seen on Thompson's Facebook page with big eyes and a bright smile, ended up in the oven. The toddler burned to death with three other kids in the home. She died without ever knowing a father.

"She was a cute little baby, I just didn't know if that was my daughter or not," said Price, who has never taken a paternity test relating to her ex-girlfriend's youngest child.

SNIP

"It's very irresponsible, someone should have been here or I should have gotten a phone call, come and get my children." Price says his two children had been staying with Thompson because he lost his job a few months ago. He says he has since tried to contact Thompson on the phone and via Facebook, but she has not responded.

SNIP

[pnwmom]

45. They make "anti-tip brackets" for stoves to prevent this from happening.

They are supposed to secure a stove to the wall. They're not as heavy as you might think.

https://books.google.com/books?id=-fYDGf4U1psC&pg=PT67&lpg=PT67&dq=running+joke+character+fiction&source=bl&ots=kwyBJicxHO&sig=s5ZWv3xhMXq-WvmMVvgirvlX1MI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjt8f6yqq3JAhVBUYgKHUqtDVUQ6AEISDAI#v=onepage&q=running%20joke%20character%20fiction&f=false


From a book called The Joy of Fatherhood:

“Be sure that anti-tip brackets have been installed on your oven to attach it to the wall. While this may not be a concern yet, once your baby can stand, he could pull the oven over on top of him, resulting in serious injury or even death.

[bob4460]

54. Fact #1 The parent is the responsible party!

End of story

[PersonNumber503602]

59. Well, whatever happened, the adults in this are pieces of shit no matter what.

Why have kids if you're irresponsible? I guess it's kinda dumb to ask irresponsible people to be responsible when performing acts that could result in a human life.

[Nonhlanhla]

65. Who leaves small children alone and go out?

I cannot even fathom that level of irresponsibility. She clearly is an irresponsible mother, and the fathers and boyfriends involved sketch a pretty bleak picture of general irresponsibility in all the "adults" involved here. Yes, I'm being judgmental. But a baby is dead, and 3 other children are scarred for life, because the people who were supposed to protect them had left them alone in the apartment.

[LisaL]

67. And she is pregnant again.

If she wants to be free to go out for pizza and whatever else, why have a child after child?

[Blandocyte]

71. Shocking stuff

Hopefully mom will be provided the level of state supervision she needs to help her avoid these lapses of judgment in the future. Tragic that a baby was killed before mom could be helped to become less harmful to her children. Now the surviving kids will be left with a story they will have to make sense of the rest of their lives.

[leftyladyfrommo]

75. This is so awful I can't even think about it.

So sad when children get caught up in adult madness.

[LiberalEsto]

80. This story is more than a week old and doesn't belong in LBN n/t

[valerief]

81. You know what the most fantastic thing about this story is?

The headline isn't "Texas toddler dies and not from gunshot or being left alone in hot car."

[LisaL]

83. Effect of a hot car would be pretty much the same as that of a hot oven.

Hot car basically becomes an oven in which a kid bakes.

[valerief]

84. You're right! But it seems parents leave their kids in cars more than

siblings leave kids in ovens. Every time a baked-baby-in-car story is posted here, there are plenty of apologists defending the parent.

[prouddemfromaustin44]

88. How awful!

Poor baby, may she RIP.

[restorefreedom]

90. y'all can call me a republican if you want

but those remaining children should be immediately removed and parental privileges revoked. probation and contact with a social worker throughout rest of pregnancy. removal of child immediately after birth.

and if i was the judge, i would impress upon her that if she chooses not to avail herself of norplant, any remaining children will be reomved upon their birth discharge.

her parenting days are done.

flame away....

[XemaSab]

93. No flames here

You leave 4 children under the age of 5 alone for an evening, your parenting days are through.

[restorefreedom]

95. can't even imagine

how a non impaired person could even think of doing that....sigh...

[passiveporcupine]

91. So, there were two adults and one couldn't stay home with the kids?

she had gone out with her boyfriend to collect a pizza and a prescription at the drug store

[restorefreedom]

92. yes, becsuse it often takes two grown ups

to get a pizz and a prescription.

these are either the two most incompetent people on the planet or the two most selfish douchebags.

poor little kid

[Snobblevitch]

98. This story begs for more details.

Was this home a rental unit? 

I learned in a business law class that since the late 70s, all ranges (free standing stove/oven combinations) must be sold with an "L" bracket that prevents the range from toppling forward. The bracket is affixed to the floor using screws so that when the range is pushed against the wall, the floor bracket is  attached to the bottom of the range. The result is that the range cannot topple forward, which appears to be what happened in this case. 

I somehow believe that if the range had not fallen forward, the siblings would have opened the door to the oven when their sister started screaming because of the pain from the heat. 

I know about this subject because my business law professor was the attorney that sued an appliance manufacturer. A five year old girl wished to see what was happening inside a kettle of boiling pasta. She opened the oven door and stood upon it to get high enough to see inside the kettle. The range fell upon her, as did the kettle of boiling pasta. She had third degree burns on her face and chest. My professor was crying as he described her injuries (I'm crying as I write this.) This girl needed skin grafts on her entire face and chest. She lost her nipples. She would never be 'normal' again. This girl would be in her 40s now. 

I wish my business law professor had never told me this story, so why do I feel the need to write it here?