Mom gets life for leaving toddler while she vacationed

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Kristel A. Candelario at her sentencing hearing and Jailyn Candelario (WKYC screenshots)

A 32-year-old mother in Ohio will spend the rest of her life behind bars for killing her 16-month-old daughter, who died of starvation and dehydration after being left home alone for more than a week while the mother went on vacation in Puerto Rico. Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge Brendan J. Sheehan on Monday ordered Kristel Candelario to serve a sentence of life without the possibility of parole in the 2023 death of young Jailyn Candelario.

Candelario last month formally pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated murder and one count of endangering the life of a child in her daughter’s heinous death.

Monday’s hearing

Sheehan said that he was sentencing Candelario to die in a prison, just like she did to her daughter, but said the only difference is that in Candelario’s case, the prison “will at least feed you and give you liquids, which you denied her.”

Live footage of the hearing was streamed by Cleveland NBC affiliate WKYC.

The sentence came after emotional testimony from several of the individuals involved in the investigation into Jailyn’s death.

Dr. Elizabeth Mooney, the forensic pathologist and deputy county medical examiner who performed the autopsy on Jailyn, addressed the court Monday morning, describing Jailyn’s death as one of the “most tragic and unfortunate cases” of her career.

Mooney said that when Jailyn was brought in to the medical examiner’s office, she weighed only 13 pounds, which meant the toddler had lost more than seven pounds since her previous doctor’s appointment less than two months earlier.

“The eyes were sunken and she had temporal wasting in her face,” Mooney continued. She also noted that Jailyn had “an abundance” of fecal matter on her hands, feet, and in her mouth, and caked to her teeth, indicating that the child ingested her own waste.

The cause of death was determined to be “starvation and severe dehydration due to pediatric neglect,” Mooney said.

The doctor’s voice began to get shaky as she discussed the physical hardships Jailyn suffered during the stretch she was left alone to die.

“In the absence of more advanced decompositional changes, I believe that the pain and suffering she endured lasted not only hours, not days, but possibly even a week. This is a pain that comes from extreme thirst and hunger. It also stems from an inherent terror of isolation or an inherent lack of someone present to provide that,” Mooney said. “This feeling of abandonment for days on end, coupled with the pain of starvation and extreme thirst is a type of suffering I don’t think any of us could ever fully fathom.”

Prosecutors told the court they had made many attempts to reach out to Jailyn’s extended family, emphasizing that “absolutely no one” had returned a call or done anything “to even acknowledge that Jailyn was a part of their family.” As such, the state said that the courtroom was filled with law enforcement personnel that worked on the case and had come two act on Jailyn behalf.

Two detectives with the Cleveland Police Department addressed the court.

“Jailyn died a long an agonizing death, afraid and alone, while her mother enjoyed the beach and sunshine,” Gomez said. “This is a case that myself, all the people behind me, and everyone around the world will have branded in our hearts and in our minds forever.

Speaking on her own behalf, Candelario told the court that she was “extremely hurt about everything that happened,” but added that “nobody knew how much I was suffering and what I was going through” and that “God and my daughter have forgiven me.”

In handing down the sentence, Sheehan alluded to the members of law enforcement who showed up to the sentencing hearing and Dr. Mooney’s testimony before telling Candelario, “You committed the ultimate act of betrayal.”

“Leaving your baby — terrified, alone, unprotected — to suffer the most gruesome death imaginable with no food, no water, no protection, and lying in her own feces,” he said. “The evidence I’ve witnessed before this court shows that you simply chose not to be there [for your daughter] simply because you wanted to have fun. You decided you needed a vacation, and what followed was absolute depravity.”

He continued to berate Candelario, telling her that she could have saved Jailyn with just a simple phone call, but chose not to. Rather, he said Candelario allowed Jailyn to stay “trapped in a tiny prison that you left her in.”

“Instead I see photos of you on a beach while your child was eating her own feces in an attempt to survive,” he said. “It didn’t look like you were too concerned about your child.”

Jailyn’s death

As previously reported by Law&Crime, officers with the Cleveland Police Department and Emergency Medical Services (EMS) personnel responded to a call at about 8 a.m. on June 16, 2023 regarding a dead baby — later identified as Jailyn — in a residence in the 3100 block of West 97th Street. The caller said she was the mother of the child and she came home and found the toddler unresponsive.

She was declared dead, and investigators found no signs of trauma, but Jailyn was extremely dehydrated.

In Jailyn’s Pack-n-Play bin, police found “soiled blankets and a bottom liner,” which they said was “saturated with urine and feces.”

Candelario confessed to leaving her toddler alone while she went on vacation for 10 days, authorities said. The incident report states that by “Candelario’s very own admission,” she revealed that she left Jailyn “at home, all alone and unattended” from June 8 until June 16 “while she was vacationing in Puerto Rico and Detroit, Michigan.”

The toddler’s remains were sent to the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office for an autopsy and further examination. The medical examiner determined “the child had been left alone and unattended for approximately 10 days and subsequently died,” officials said.