AURELIANO VALDEZ - 2 yo (2010) Accused: Mother-Florcita Valdez - Ceres/ Modesto CA

CERES -- More than a year and a half after a 2-year-old boy drowned in his family's murky backyard pool, his mother has been charged with murder.



Rescue workers found Aureliano Joel Valdez dead in the deep end of the algae-tainted pool on Larson Lane in Ceres minutes after he was reported missing by his mother, Florcita Valdez, on the evening of July 18, 2010.



During the weeks after her son's death, Valdez said she was inside her house baking a cake when she realized her son was missing. She said she wasn't worried about potential criminal charges because, while she had a methamphetamine addiction in the past, she was not using drugs at the time of her child's death and did the best she could to care for her children.

But Valdez, 35, was arrested Thursday on suspicion of murder. She pleaded not guilty in Stanislaus Superior Court on Friday, according to Assistant District Attorney Carol Shipley.

Shipley said it took nearly 19 months to charge Valdez because the district attorney's office asked detectives to do "follow-up" on the investigation, but she wouldn't elaborate or discuss the basis for the murder charge.

Valdez also was charged with three counts of permitting a "child to suffer under circumstances likely to cause great bodily injury or death," according to the criminal complaint. The victims listed in the complaint are Aureliano as well as Valdez's 15-year-old daughter and 9-year-old son.

Valdez's eldest son was living with her father, Aureliano Ramos, when his brother died and was not listed as a victim in the criminal complaint.

Grandfather blames CPS

The other children were taken from Valdez by Child Protective Services the day after her son's funeral and have been living with Ramos ever since. Four months after the 2-year-old's death, Valdez said she was having supervised visits with her children once a week and was working on regaining full custody.

Ramos said Monday night that he was surprised by his daughter's arrest and stands by his belief that the tragedy could have been avoided had Child Protective Services intervened. He said he called the agency multiple times to report that Valdez left her children home alone, although he said he never saw her abuse them.

The most recent call, he said, was one week before Aureliano's death.

"I told them, 'What … are you waiting for? Are you waiting for a tragedy to happen?' " Ramos said.

Valdez confirmed that CPS workers had visited her home multiple times. Public records indicate that police responded to Valdez's home 28 times from July 2008 to July 2010. The calls ranged from family disputes to trespassing.

Valdez is to appear in court again Wednesday for a pretrial hearing and bail review. Her bail is set at $500,000; she was being held in jail Monday night.


Read more here: http://www.modbee.com/2012/02/13/2068453/ceres-mom-charged-in-toddlers.html#storylink#storylink=cpy

MODESTO -- A Ceres woman accused of murder in the drowning of her 2-year-old son
made a brief court appearance Tuesday morning.
Authorities arrested Florcita Valdez after her son, Aureliano Joel Valdez, was
discovered in the murky backyard pool of their Ceres home in July 2010.
There was talk in late April that Tuesday's appearance in Stanislaus County
Superior Court could produce a plea deal. Instead, Judge Linda McFadden
scheduled another pretrial hearing for June 5.
Valdez entered the courtroom in red jail garb, mouthing the words, "I
love you. I love you" to her friend Monica Saldana, who was sitting in the second row.
About a minute later, on her way out, Valdez yelled "I love you, Monica," before the bailiff admonished her.
Outside the courtroom, Saldana said her friend was "not the monster" people are making her out to be.
"She's not a murderer," Saldana said.
Facing other counts

Prosecutors also have charged Valdez with three counts of permitting a child to
suffer under circumstances likely to cause great bodily injury or death.
Valdez's 16-year-old daughter and 10-year-old son are listed on the
complaint as well as the toddler.
The two children, along with Valdez's 17-year-old son, are living with Susana Ramos, Valdez's stepmother, in Ceres.
Ramos said Tuesday that the children are doing fine, and the oldest just graduated from high school.
She said she takes the older children to jail to see their mom, and
otherwise tries to keep them occupied to keep their minds off the legal proceedings.
"They're very upset," she said. "It is their mother."
In April, Deputy District Attorney Marlisa Ferreira argued that Valdez and
her children have been "in and out" of the supervision of Child Protective Services.
"Her children had been taken away from her on numerous occasions," Ferreira said in court.
Ramos said she disagrees with the murder charge and said that if law
enforcement and social service officers had done more to help Valdez, Aureliano would be alive.
She didn't understand why charges were filed more than a year after the drowning.
Valdez said she was baking a cake along with a friend and two of her children
when she noticed her son was missing. Valdez called police, who arrived
within 10 minutes and searched the property and neighboring homes, Ceres police said.
Their attention quickly turned to the pool, which
because of the high amounts of algae, offered little to no visibility.
They found Aureliano while checking the bottom with brooms and poles.
Cardiopulmonary resuscitation was started immediately, and Aureliano was
taken to a Modesto hospital, where he died.
http://www.modbee.com/2012/05/29/2219707/ceres-mom-in-court-in-childs-drowning.html

Ceres woman gets 4 years in prison in son's drowning
BY ROSALIO AHUMADA
rahumada@modbee.comJanuary 14, 2013

MODESTO — A Ceres mother on Monday pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to more than four years in prison in the 2010 drowning of her 2-year-old son, who was found dead in the deep end of the family's murky swimming pool.

Florcita Valdez, 36, initially was charged with murder in the death of her son, Aureliano Joel Valdez, along with three counts of child endangerment. The victims listed in the criminal complaint were Aureliano, Valdez's 15-year-old daughter and 9-year-old son.

The defendant agreed to a plea deal that resulted in a sentence of four years four months in prison. Along with the manslaughter charge, Valdez pleaded no contest to one count of child endangerment for not providing adequate care to her 9-year-old son when the drowning occurred.

The rest of the charges were dropped as part of the plea agreement with the prosecution. Deputy District Attorney Marlisa Ferreira told the judge that under the circumstances, this was the best agreement.

Read more here: http://www.modbee.com/2013/01/14/2532576/ceres-mom-sentenced-to-4-years.html#storylink=cpy