Aaron Minor, Age 3

A 3 year old little boy lost his life because of cracks in a system. He lived with his mother, who apparently is mentally not able to care for the boy. According to records, CPS worker Elaine Brown went to check on Aaron the day after receiving a notice the mom wasn't taking her medications. She followed up the next day noting that Aaron appeared fine, not abused, nor neglected.

About a month later Aarons body was discovered by a maintenance worker due to the smell. Mom was found in the hospital the following day. 9 days prior, she'd been found unconscious on the grass outside and hospitalized for two days. CPS never saw the mother or child again, but sent a letter on May 9 asking the mother to contact them. But, she never did and there was no other follow up.

I bring this case to you because Ms. Brown and her supervisor Kelly Williams had been charged with involuntary manslaughter, child abuse, willfull neglect of duty, and other charges. The manslaughter charges got dropped today because its silly to think they could forsee his mother going into the hospital etc.

This case is like a puzzle with many pieces. You have DCF, you have the police who responded when she was found unresponsive, you have whomever removed her and hospitalized her, etc. All had crucial pieces of the puzzle but weren't working together. Why wasn't Aaron placed in foster care when she was found unresponsive or a family member contacted? It is a sad case, but the one person bearing responsibility for the welfare of Aaron is his mother, who's mentally incompetent to stand trial on her charges. There should be things triggered when a single parent is taken away by ambulance. Why this didn't happen for poor little Aaron? Who knows. Hopefully DCF, the police, and first responders can get a group together to start working on new policies and procedures so that they don't have this happen again.