A Minnesota couple has been charged with manslaughter after their 10-year-old daughter, who has autism, died while she was “zipped up” in a broken safety bed for 10 to 12 hours without supervision.
Heather Lynn Cross, 49, and Darcy Ronald Cross, 57, were also charged with contributing to the need for child protective services after the girl’s death on August 28, KSTP reported.
According to court documents, medics were called to the home that afternoon but found the girl already in rigor mortis, meaning she had died hours before 911 was called. She had been crushed by the safety bed, which was broken.
First responders also found that the girl was living in filthy conditions with urine and feces on her mattress, pad, and other parts of the room.
Both the 10-year-old and an older daughter, who also has autism, slept in the safety beds, which consist of mesh netting around a frame and a cage. The netting can only be opened from the outside.
Heather Cross told investigators she had checked on the 10-year-old between 4 and 6 a.m. on the day she died to give her medication, but court documents say that both children were apparently left alone and unsupervised for 10 to 12 hours after that.
The doctor who prescribed the safety beds said it was a “complete misuse of the equipment” for the children to be confined inside during the day when they were awake.
The manufacturer of the beds said they had received no requests for repairs on the beds, adding that the mattresses in use were not the ones that came with the beds.
During social services visits in September about the surviving daughter, the court documents say, a worker told Heather Cross the girl should not be zipped into the bed during the day, and Heather Cross responded that she would zip her in whenever she wanted to.
The Crosses were arrested on September 17, and the other daughter was taken into protective custody.
