LAUREN MICHELE McCONNIEL - 5 yo - (2010) Muncie (NE of Indy) IN

May 12, 2011

Witness says Brittany McConniel vowed to 'break' stepdaughter

DOUGLAS WALKER

MUNCIE -- Ryan McConniel on Wednesday described the myriad of bizarre punishments he said his then-wife and an accused child molester their family lived with concocted for his now-deceased daughter Lauren.

Brittany McConniel, 25 -- on trial this week for neglect of a dependent resulting in death, filed after the March 2010 death of her 5-year-old stepdaughter -- forced the little girl to do jumping jacks for up to 50 consecutive minutes, along with holding heavy objects or running for set periods of time, usually after the child had bathroom accidents, Ryan McConniel told Delaware Circuit Court 5 jurors.

The witness also said McConniel and her stepfather, Robert E. Lee, 44, used posts from a crib to beat Lauren's hands and the soles of her feet, and also used wet rags to beat her legs.

Lee suggested the latter punishment after seeing it inflicted on a character on a television crime drama, Ryan McConniel said.

Brittany McConniel told authorities investigating Lauren's death that while growing up, she was repeatedly molested by Robert Lee. He has not been charged in connection with those allegations, or his purported abuse of Lauren McConniel.

Brittany McConniel is charged with a Class A felony carrying a maximum 50-year prison term. Her ex-husband faces the same charge, but has negotiated a deal with prosecutors, agreeing to testify against his wife -- and perhaps other people -- and to plead guilty to a less severe neglect count that carries a possible 20-year sentence.

Ryan McConniel also said Wednesday that Brittany at one point told him "Lauren needs to start being good or I'm going to break her."

"Did she break her?" Delaware County Prosecutor Jeffrey Arnold asked.

"I think we all know the answer to that," Ryan McConniel responded.

"I want to know what you think," Arnold said.

"Yes, she did," said the witness, who then began to weep.

The victim's father said he removed Lauren from the custody of her mother, who lived in Tennessee, in the summer of 2009 at the insistence of his then-wife, Lee and other household members, who thought the girl's presence in their home would result in child support payments.

"We just needed the money," he said.

The girl, described as healthy and happy when she left Tennessee, died the following March after suffering from severe emaciation and several other health problems -- and with enough salt in her system to alone have caused her death.

The 34-year-old father -- who said he was physically intimidated by the larger Lee -- said the attacks on his daughter also came after "she would smart off or leave a toy out."

During the forced exercise, Ryan McConniel said, Lauren "would cry and ask if she could stop," only to have her stepmother then extend the period of activity by 10 minutes.

McConniel and other witnesses said Lauren was treated far more harshly than other children in the home, including her older sister and Brittany McConniel's son from a previous relationship.

Arnold and Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman have said Brittany McConniel repeatedly told friends and family members concerned about Lauren's deteriorating condition that she was under the care of a Winchester physician -- who testified Wednesday that he never treated the girl.

Under cross examination by defense attorney Zaki Ali, Ryan McConniel acknowledged he had sent his wife supportive letters soon after their arrests last summer.

"Lauren had just died," Ryan McConniel said. "CPS had taken my (other) children. We were incarcerated. I needed to communicate with someone."

Linda Smith, a Gaston woman who is both Ryan McConniel's aunt and Brittany McConniel's stepgrandmother, testified Wednesday that she found Lauren to be "a delightful child, a pleasure to be around," soon after she was placed in her father's custody, but later saw a marked deterioration in her health and spirits.

"The child could light up a room with her smile," Smith recalled of her earliest dealings with the girl.

About a month before Lauren's death, Smith visited the McConniel home and said she was startled to find Lauren shivering in a shower, under the spray of "ice-cold" water.

Smith said she then confronted Brittany McConniel, who claimed Lauren was "used to cold showers."

The witness said the girl "looked terrible ... like she had lost 20 pounds when she couldn't afford to lose one."

Brittany McConniel told her Lauren was being treated twice weekly by a doctor for anorexia, the Gaston woman testified.

After Smith's potentially damaging testimony, Judge Thomas Cannon Jr. called a brief recess.

When Brittany McConniel returned to the courtroom a few minutes later, she at first elected to sit in the courtroom gallery rather than at the defense table, two empty seats away from Smith, although the defendant said nothing.

Testimony in the trial, expected to last through much of next week, is set to resume at 8:30 a.m. today.

Contact Douglas Walker at 213-5851.


http://www.thestarpress.com/print/article/20110512/NEWS01/105120345/Witness-says-Brittany-McConniel-vowed-break-stepdaughter

Photos of Lauren McConniel bring jurors to tears
May 13, 2011
Written by
ANDREW WALKER

MUNCIE -- Photographs of a painfully thin Lauren McConniel taken shortly before and after the 5-year-old Muncie girl's death brought jurors to tears Thursday as the trial of her stepmother reached its fourth day.

Brittany McConniel, 25, is charged with neglect of a dependent resulting in death.

Prosecutors allege McConniel and her then-husband, Ryan, failed to seek medical attention for the girl until shortly before she died in May 2010, despite the child's extreme weight loss and increasingly self-destructive behavior.

Mary Verghese, an emergency room physician at Riley Hospital for Children, testified Thursday that Lauren was emaciated and dehydrated when her father and stepmother brought her to the Indianapolis hospital on March 3, 2010.

The girl weighed about 28 pounds, the typical weight for a child half her age, another Riley physician said.

"It was something you'd see in a third-world country," said Laura Pachloski, a primary care physician in Riley's pediatric intensive care unit.

Verghese said Lauren was so dehydrated when she arrived at the hospital, when the girl cried -- in response to painful stimuli -- "she had no tears."

"She appeared cachectic and malnourished with her bones sticking out on her cheeks and ribs," the doctor said.

During testimony by Sgt. Jimmy Gibson, lead investigator in the McConniel case for the Muncie Police Department, jurors were shown 22 photographs, most showing the victim while she was hospitalized, and two taken during her autopsy.

Zaki Ali, Brittany McConniel's defense attorney, failed in a bid to have Judge Thomas Cannon Jr. declare five of the photographs inadmissible.

Two jurors became visibly upset while the photographs were passed, one by one, wiping tears from their eyes and shaking their heads in disbelief.

One juror suddenly stood up and asked to be excused, but he was instructed to sit down by Cannon, who then called a brief recess.

Cannon met with that juror in the judge's chambers -- along with Ali, Delaware County Prosecutor Jeffrey Arnold and Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman -- and it was determined the man would remain on the jury.

(Page 2 of 2)

Ali's client remained composed, as she has throughout the trial, while the photographs were passed.

The Riley physicians testified that Lauren's sodium level was dangerously high when she arrived at the hospital. Prosecutors have suggested the girl somehow ingested large amounts of salt in her family's South Ebright Street home prior to her death.

In part because of the girl's abnormally high sodium level, Pachloski said she told Ryan and Brittany McConniel it was "highly likely that she would not survive."

Witnesses in the trial have provided grim accounts of Lauren's behavior in the final weeks of her life, with episodes that saw her running into walls, biting the tips of her fingers and toes, making herself vomit, trying to eat vomit and feces, and having hallucinations with "little blue bunnies" telling her to be violent.

A juror submitted a written question to Pachloski, asking if hallucinations could be a result or side effect of high sodium levels.

"Yes," the doctor responded.

Also Thursday:

• Ellen Harrington, a counselor at a central Indiana psychiatric hospital, said the McConniels brought Lauren there shortly before, at Harrington's urging, they took her to Riley.

She said the parents gave her a false phone number for a Winchester physician who authorities allege they falsely told friends and relatives had been treating Lauren. The couple also refused to sign waivers to release information to that physician.

Lauren "became more lifeless" as an examination at that facility continued, Harrington said, and it "appeared she was fading."

Brittany McConniel "blamed everything" on Lauren's mother, Harrington said. Witnesses have said Lauren was a healthy and happy child when her father removed from the custody of her mother, a resident of Tennessee, about seven months before her death. If convicted, Brittany McConniel would face a maximum 50-year prison term.

Ryan McConniel has struck a deal with prosecutors, agreeing to plead guilty to a less severe count of neglect, and this week testified against his now-ex-wife, saying she was frequently abusive to his daughter, inflicting a series of bizarre and severe punishments, including forced exercise.

Ryan McConniel also said his then-spouse and members of her family wanted him to pursue custody of Lauren in hopes of obtaining child-support payments from her mother.

Testimony in the trial will resume at 8:30 a.m. today.

Douglas Walker contributed to this article.


http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110513/NEWS01/105130344

'Only Round One': Other prosecutions possible in Lauren McConniel's death
May 15, 2011
Written by
DOUGLAS WALKER


MUNCIE -- The ongoing trial of Lauren McConniel's stepmother will not represent a conclusion to the official investigation of events that led to the 5-year-old Muncie girl's death last year.

In fact, Brittany McConniel's trial, likely to conclude this week, might end up being a beginning, not the end, in terms of related prosecutions.

As grim details regarding the young victim's final weeks came to light through last week's testimony, the public responded -- in the form of Internet postings, calls to The Star Press newsroom and, in one case, a large cardboard sign, addressed to Delaware County Prosecutor Jeffrey Arnold and left on one of his staff member's vehicles, parked outside the county building.

The most common reaction: With Lauren's father set to plead guilty to a neglect count that could send him to prison for 20 years, and her stepmother standing trial on a charge with a maximum 50-year sentence, why aren't the other adults who lived in the home in which Lauren wasted away also facing charges?

Most of the speculation focuses on 44-year-old Robert E. Lee, Brittany McConniel's stepfather. Witnesses, particularly Ryan McConniel, have described Lee as an active participant in the abuse of the 5-year-old victim, both suggesting and participating in forms of corporal punishment -- acts that many would label torture -- that targeted Lauren.

"This trial is only Round One," Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman said when asked about future prosecutions last week.

When Ryan McConniel signed a plea agreement in early April, he pledged to provide "truthful testimony" in trials and grand jury proceedings related to his daughter's death. In an accompanying document, Hoffman wrote that "not all of those persons (involved) have been formally charged with criminal offenses as they are currently under investigation."

Hoffman last week declined to speculate on who else might be charged in the case, but said anyone "who participated in the abuse or neglect or knew about it and did nothing may be hearing from us in the very near future."

(Page 2 of 4)

The deputy prosecutor also declined to say whether his recent request to extend the term of a sitting grand jury was related to the McConniel investigation.
A troubled past

The Star Press last week reviewed court documents in Wabash County stemming from Robert E. Lee's 2002 prosecution on a misdemeanor battery charge.

Included was a transcript, exceeding 30 pages, of an interview Wabash County police did with a then-16-year-old girl who said that Lee had been sexually abusing her for as long as a decade.

The victim in that 2002 case is today known as Brittany McConniel, defendant in the ongoing trial, and one of two girls at the time claiming to have been fondled by Lee.

The teenager said Lee had been abusing her since she was between the ages of five and seven, "too many times to count, almost every day."

Asked when the assaults had ended, the witness responded, "Yesterday."

Most of the attacks involved fondling, with her stepfather at other times forcing her to expose her breasts or to watch him masturbate, McConniel, then known as Brittany Lee, told police. He also habitually watched her bathe, she reported, and made her pose in a provocative manner.

"He just tells me not to say anything, because if I told anybody that it would hurt my mom, and she wouldn't love me any more," the teenager said. "And then he would hurt me."

She said Lee frequently linked the abuse to her ability to socialize outside their home.

"He would make me stroke him, or you know, kiss him before I could do anything with my friends," she said.

The girl said her stepfather also told her: "I don't love you like a daughter. I love you like my mate."

The documents in Lee's court file don't reflect what led prosecutors in that northern Indiana county to charge Lee only with battery, He pleaded guilty to the Class B misdemeanor charge, the same level of crime as public intoxication, and was sentenced to 45 days in jail.

However, police reports indicate officers apparently believed the intellectual abilities of Lee, who lived on a Social Security disability income, were so limited that he could barely participate in an understandable conversation.

(Page 3 of 4)

One officer wrote that Lee told him he was unable to read or write. When informed that two girls had accused him of fondling them, the officer reported, Lee at first maintained his innocence, but then said "if the facts were true, he was sorry," but could not remember the incidents in question.

Told he could be facing serious criminal charges, Lee "looked straight ahead" before announcing "he was hungry and wanted to leave," the officer wrote.

(Also possibly complicating Lee's Wabash County prosecution were the many locations of his alleged crimes, only a few of which took place in that county, as the family moved from home to home, often staying with relatives in Indiana and elsewhere.)
'The molester'

Testimony during her trial has indicated Brittany McConniel last year told Muncie police investigating her stepdaughter's death of her own victimization by her stepfather.

Ryan McConniel confirmed that he also was aware of the Lee family's dark secrets when he agreed to share homes, in Winchester, Farmland and Muncie -- with his wife and their combined four children, including his two daughters from a previous marriage -- that were also occupied by Lee, his wife, Angela, and their other adult daughter.

Brittany McConniel's defense attorney, Zaki Ali, wasn't concerned with upholding the reputation of his client's stepfather, repeatedly referring to Robert E. Lee as "the molester" as he demanded to know how Ryan McConniel had allowed his children, including Lauren, to live with a man he believed to be a pedophile.

"I had nowhere else to go," McConniel responded. "It was easier to go along with what (Brittany) wanted then pay the consequences later."

McConniel's description of his then-father-in-law contrasted sharply with the meek, mentally challenged suspect portrayed in Wabash County police reports.

McConniel said Lee warned him he "would hurt me" if he complained about the treatment of Lauren, primarily by her stepmother and Lee.

Both Brittany McConniel and Lee participated in a series of punishments designed for Lauren, the victim's father said, including beating the girl's hands and the soles of her feet with two posts from a baby's crib, wrapped in electrical tape by Lee, and forced exercises, including jumping jacks for as long as 50 minutes at a stretch.


(Page 4 of 4)

"They weren't hitting her, so I really didn't make a big deal out of the (exercises)," Ryan McConniel told jurors. He also said Brittany McConniel vowed "she would divorce me and I would never see my children again" if he told anyone about her treatment of Lauren.

It was also Robert E. Lee who saw a crime victim beaten about the legs with wet rags on a TV crime drama, and then suggested the same thing be done to Lauren, said Ryan McConniel, who sometimes was away from his family's home for up to 14 hours a day, the household's only wage earner while also attending Ivy Tech classes.

Testimony has indicated the McConniels consistently lied when asked to list the members of their household, never mentioning the Lees.

Ryan McConniel, along with Robert E. Lee's mother, testified that Lee had joined his stepdaughter in insisting that Ryan pursue custody of Lauren, then staying with her mother in Tennessee. Their motivation, according to Ryan McConniel: A hope that Lauren's arrival would prompt the delivery of child-support payments to their household.

While no one has specifically said that Lauren McConniel was sexually assaulted in her final months, medical witnesses have suggested her increasingly self-destructive behaviors were consistent with those of young victims of such crimes.

One of the most haunting episodes described last week came late in Lauren's life, when her father and stepmother took her to a Muncie urgent care clinic, not to seek treatment for her dramatic weight loss, but to resolve an argument over Brittany's bizarre and unfounded claim that her young stepdaughter was a hermaphrodite.

Nurse-practitioner William Gosnell, falsely told that the couple thought the child had a urinary tract infection, reported Lauren initially did not want to submit to an examination, but later cooperated after he briefly left the McConniel family alone.

Gosnell -- who quickly determined there was nothing abnormal about Lauren's reproductive organs -- said after he examined her, the girl pulled herself into a corner of the examining table and began punching herself in the forehead.

Again. And again and again.



http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110515/NEWS01/105150345

McConniel: 'We should have got her help'
Brittany McConniel wept during police interview when asked if her stepfather sexually abused her
May 17, 2011
28 Comments
Written by
DOUGLAS WALKER


MUNCIE -- Jurors in her Delaware Circuit Court 5 trial finally heard from Brittany McConniel on Monday, but not from the witness stand.

Instead, prosecutors Jeffrey Arnold and Eric Hoffman presented a recording of an interview McConniel gave to Muncie police investigators in March 2010, only a few hours before her stepdaughter, Lauren, was pronounced dead at an Indianapolis hospital.

The 25-year-old Muncie woman is charged with neglect of a dependent resulting in death, a Class A felony carrying a maximum 50-year prison term.

Authorities allege she and her then-husband, Ryan, failed to seek medical treatment in time to save the life of his 5-year-old daughter, who suffered from severe malnutrition and other health problems but apparently died as a result of ingesting a large amount of salt.

Testimony in the trial, expected to end this week, has indicated the girl lost about 10 pounds in the final weeks of her life and was severely emaciated and near death when the McConniels took her to Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis.

In her interview with Muncie police sergeants Jimmy Gibson and Linda Cook, Brittany McConniel said the girl "went from skipping a meal or two to not eating, unless we made her eat."

While Lauren was taken to physicians four times during the seven months she was in the McConniel household, those visits were for treatment of a broken finger, an eye injury, a purported urinary tract infection, and a possible head injury, not for her dramatic weight loss. The couple falsely claimed she was being treated for an eating disorder by a Winchester physician, witnesses said.

"There's a lot of stuff we could have done sooner," Brittany McConniel told the officers. "I know we should have got her help. ... We didn't know where to go."

Ryan McConniel, 34, last week testified against his ex-wife and has agreed to plead guilty to a neglect charge that could send him to prison for 20 years.

He claimed the defendant and her stepfather, Robert E. Lee, abused Lauren, beating her on the hands and soles of her feet and forcing her to engage in exercise as punishment, including doing jumping jacks until she was exhausted.


(Page 2 of 2)

In her interview with police 14 months ago, Brittany McConniel denied nearly identical allegations that had been made by Lauren's older sister and the defendant's son from a previous relationship.

"I don't know where they got that from," she said of the reported beatings. "If it happened, I was not aware of it."

She acknowledged Lauren at times was ordered to do "maybe 10 jumping jacks."

"There was never a time she said, 'I'm too tired,' " McConniel said.

During the interview, McConniel began to weep when the officers asked her about allegations her stepfather, Lee, had sexually abused her while she was a child.

"That's why we're all in the basement!" she said, noting that she and her husband and their children lived on the lower level of a house also occupied by her mother, stepfather and sister.

In the courtroom Monday, as that portion of the recording was played, McConniel began to cry, apparently for the first time during five days of testimony that at times has even drawn tears from jurors. Public defender Zaki Ali left the defense table to retrieve some tissues for his client.

During the March 2010 interview, Gibson and Cook suggested that Lauren's unsettling behavior, including acts of self-mutilation and threats of violence after moving in with the McConniels, might have been her response to being sexually abused, perhaps by the same person that the defendant said began assaulting her when she was 5 years old.

McConniel -- who said she was sexually abused by Lee for more than a decade before being placed in foster care -- said Lauren "never said anything" about being assaulted.

"She never told us," the defendant added, acknowledging her then-husband had "voiced concerns" about his daughters living in the same house with Lee.

Witnesses have said the McConniels frequently lied when asked to name the members of their household, never mentioning the Lees.

Arnold and Hoffman are expected to complete the state's case today, when testimony will resume at 11:30 a.m.

Contact Douglas Walker at 213-5851.


http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110517/BUSTED/105170334

Forensic expert: Lauren McConniel suffered 'inflicted trauma'
May 18, 2011
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Written by
DOUGLAS WALKER

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Defense attorney, Zaki Ali, focuses on Brittany McConniel's stepfather

MUNCIE -- Lauren McConniel was the victim of "inflicted trauma (and) child abuse," according to a forensic pediatrician who last year helped treat the emaciated and dying Muncie girl in the final days of her life.

Antoinette Laskey, who leads the Indiana State Child Fatality Review Team in addition to her duties at Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis, might end up being the final prosecution witness in the trial of Lauren's stepmother, Brittany McConniel.

The 25-year-old defendant, now listed in court records at a Farmland address, is charged with neglect of a dependent resulting in death, a Class A felony carrying a standard 30-year prison term.

Prosecutors Jeffrey Arnold and Eric Hoffman are expected to rest their case soon after the Delaware Circuit Court 5 trial resumes at 8:30 a.m. today.

Public defender Zaki Ali will then begin presenting his case, which might include the testimony of his client.

McConniel and her then-husband, Ryan, are accused of failing to seek medical treatment for Lauren as she experienced a dramatic physical and emotional decline after being removed from the custody of her mother, who lives in Tennessee, in August 2009.

By the time the McConniels took Lauren to Riley Hospital on March 3, 2010, she was extremely malnourished and apparently had recently ingested enough salt to cause her death six days later.

Laskey on Tuesday recalled her first glimpse of the dying girl in Riley's pediatric intensive care unit.

"I couldn't believe she was still alive," said the pediatrician. "I see a lot of kids, but it was that bad. ... There was nothing to her, not a single ounce of body fat. She was covered in bruises."

Laskey said Lauren, at 5 years and 5 months of age, weighed less than 29 pounds, the average weight for a 30-month-old girl.

It quickly became apparent Lauren's brain injuries, caused by the massive dose of salt, would make recovery impossible, she said.

"We tried very hard to save Lauren," the witness said. "The fact is that she (was) in total system failure."


(Page 2 of 2)

With images of the girl taken during her hospitalization being displayed on a large screen, Laskey used a laser pointer to emphasize how painfully thin the child had become while in the care of her father and stepmother.

She also pointed out bruises -- some on Lauren's back, legs and the soles of her feet. The latter injuries appeared consistent with allegations -- from Ryan McConniel, who has struck a plea deal with prosecutors, and the couple's other children -- that Brittany McConniel and her stepfather, Robert E. Lee, used wooden sticks to beat Lauren on the hands and feet.

Other bruises also appear to have been inflicted elsewhere on her body with a similar object.

Laskey also said that contrary to claims by the McConniels that Lauren had been treated for a broken finger suffered in a fall, X-rays showed healing fractures of bones in her hand, consistent with similar abuse.

In a March 2010 interview with police -- portions of which shown to jurors on Monday and Tuesday -- Brittany McConniel denied allegations that she beat her stepdaughter's hands and feet.

"I did not do that," she insisted, while acknowledging she was "not a perfect parent, not even close."

While the McConniels said Lauren's significant weight loss came during her final weeks, Laskey testified Tuesday that the girl's extreme emaciation would have been the result of malnutrition suffered over an extended period.

The pediatrician called forced exercise -- which witnesses have said Brittany McConniel and Lee used as another method to punish Lauren -- a form of "torture."

She also said she suspected "punishment" might have been a factor in the events that led to Lauren's ingestion of a fatal amount of salt.

Asked by public defender Zaki Ali who had inflicted Lauren's bruises or given her the salt, Laskey responded, "I don't know."

But the pediatrician said she was "fairly clearly told that Brittany was the primary caregiver for Lauren, because Ryan was always at work or at school."

Laskey also said when she questioned the McConniels about what adults lived in their home, neither mentioned their housemates the Lees -- Robert E. Lee; his wife, Angela, who is the defendant's mother, and their other adult daughter.

In her 2010 statement to police, Brittany McConniel said that Robert E. Lee repeatedly molested her for about a decade beginning when she was 5 years old.



http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110518/NEWS01/105180339

Defense attorney, Zaki Ali, focuses on Brittany McConniel's stepfather
May 18, 2011
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Written by
DOUGLAS WALKER

Related Links
Forensic expert: Lauren McConniel suffered 'inflicted trauma'

MUNCIE -- Robert E. Lee wasn't in Delaware Circuit Court 5 on Tuesday, but the 44-year-old Muncie man's name kept coming up.

Lee's stepdaughter, 25-year-old Brittany McConniel, is standing trial on a neglect charge that stems from the March 2010 death of her own stepdaughter, Lauren.

McConniel's public defender, Zaki Ali, went so far Tuesday as to ask a witness whether Lee might have set out to kill Lauren.

Authorities said the 5-year-old girl -- who spent the last seven months of her life in a household that included both Brittany McConniel and Lee -- was suffering from extreme malnutrition when she was brought to Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis, although her death there six days later was largely caused by her body's reaction to the ingestion of a lethal amount of salt.

For the second consecutive day on Tuesday, jurors viewed portions of a recorded interview Muncie police conducted with Brittany McConniel the week of Lauren's death.

During that March 2010 conversation, McConniel said while she was growing up, her stepfather molested her nearly "every day," and also threatened to kill her if she told anyone about the abuse. (Lee was arrested on related allegations in Wabash County in 2002, but pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor battery charge.)

City police sergeants Jimmy Gibson and Linda Cook repeatedly asked McConniel if she believed that Lee might have subjected Lauren McConniel to the same type of abuse during the final months of her life.

In addition to becoming emaciated, witnesses have testified, Lauren at times exhibited self-destructive behavior associated with young victims of sexual abuse.

In the hours before she was hospitalized, Lauren somehow ingested enough salt to cause seizures and brain injuries her weakened body could not recover from.

The same day, a phone call to the McConniel-Lee household -- answered by Robert E. Lee's wife, Angela -- brought word that officer Cook would later that week interview Lauren about possible abuse allegations.

Less than 12 hours later, the girl was on a respirator in Riley Hospital's intensive care unit. She would never regain consciousness.

(Page 2 of 2)

During their interview with McConniel, Gibson and Cook noted that a recent segment on ABC-TV's 20/20 had focused in part on the possibility of fatally poisoning someone with salt.

Gibson asked McConniel whether Lee would have had "any time to give (Lauren) salt?"

"I don't know," McConniel responded.

"Do you think Robert would hurt Lauren to protect himself?"

"I don't know," McConniel repeated. "He put the fear in me."

During the 2010 interview, the police officers revealed that when they were scheduled to interview Lee that week in the wake of Lauren's hospitalization, he checked himself into a Winchester hospital, purporting to be ill.

His wife, meanwhile, at first told police she didn't remember her husband's 2002 arrest and prosecution, which resulted in her daughter spending more than two years in foster care.

When defense attorney Ali cross-examined officer Gibson on Tuesday afternoon, he repeatedly asked questions focusing on Lee's possible role in the case.

"We suspected Lauren was being sexually abused," Gibson told the attorney. "I believe she was being abused by Robert (Lee). I believe she was being abused by others, possibly, in the house."

"Do you think Robert would have hurt Lauren to protect himself?" the attorney asked Gibson.

That question drew an objection from Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman.

"I'll give you some leeway, but not that much," Judge Thomas Cannon Jr. told Ali.

Asked by Ali whether Lee faces any charges related to Lauren McConniel, Gibson responded, "Not at this point."

Prosecutors and police have indicated their investigation into the events leading to Lauren's death is still ongoing.


http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110518/NEWS01/105180332

POLICE INTERVIEW USED AGAINST McCONNIEL
17.05.11

Filed Under: ECI News

A woman accused of being responsible for her stepdaughter’s death has told a jury she knows she should have gotten the girl help. But 25-year old Brittany McConniel didn’t make the admission on the witness stand in her trial Monday. Instead, the prosecution played an excerpt of a recording of an interview police did with the step mom hours before five-year old Lauren McConniel died. Brittany McConniel faces up to 50 years in prison if she’s convicted.




http://www.bybradio.net/2011/05/17/police-interview-used-against-mcconniel/

Lauren McConniel was the victim of "inflicted trauma (and) child
abuse," according to a forensic pediatrician who last year helped treat
the emaciated and dying Muncie girl in the final days of her life.Antoinette
Laskey, who leads the Indiana State Child Fatality Review Team in
addition to her duties at Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis,
might end up being the final prosecution witness in the trial of
Lauren's stepmother, Brittany McConniel.The
25-year-old defendant, now listed in court records at a Farmland
address, is charged with neglect of a dependent resulting in death, a
Class A felony carrying a standard 30-year prison term.Prosecutors
Jeffrey Arnold and Eric Hoffman are expected to rest their case soon
after the Delaware Circuit Court 5 trial resumes at 8:30 a.m. today.Public defender Zaki Ali will then begin presenting his case, which might include the testimony of his client.McConniel
and her then-husband, Ryan, are accused of failing to seek medical
treatment for Lauren as she experienced a dramatic physical and
emotional decline after being removed from the custody of her mother,
who lives in Tennessee, in August 2009.By
the time the McConniels took Lauren to Riley Hospital on March 3, 2010,
she was extremely malnourished and apparently had recently ingested
enough salt to cause her death six days later.Laskey on Tuesday recalled her first glimpse of the dying girl in Riley's pediatric intensive care unit."I
couldn't believe she was still alive," said the pediatrician. "I see a
lot of kids, but it was that bad. ... There was nothing to her, not a
single ounce of body fat. She was covered in bruises."Laskey said Lauren, at 5 years and 5 months of age, weighed less than 29 pounds, the average weight for a 30-month-old girl.It
quickly became apparent Lauren's brain injuries, caused by the massive
dose of salt, would make recovery impossible, she said."We tried very hard to save Lauren," the witness said. "The fact is that she (was) in total system failure."
With images of the girl taken during her hospitalization being
displayed on a large screen, Laskey used a laser pointer to emphasize
how painfully thin the child had become while in the care of her father
and stepmother.She also pointed out
bruises -- some on Lauren's back, legs and the soles of her feet. The
latter injuries appeared consistent with allegations -- from Ryan
McConniel, who has struck a plea deal with prosecutors, and the couple's
other children -- that Brittany McConniel and her stepfather, Robert E.
Lee, used wooden sticks to beat Lauren on the hands and feet.Other bruises also appear to have been inflicted elsewhere on her body with a similar object.Laskey
also said that contrary to claims by the McConniels that Lauren had
been treated for a broken finger suffered in a fall, X-rays showed
healing fractures of bones in her hand, consistent with similar abuse.In
a March 2010 interview with police -- portions of which shown to jurors
on Monday and Tuesday -- Brittany McConniel denied allegations that she
beat her stepdaughter's hands and feet."I did not do that," she insisted, while acknowledging she was "not a perfect parent, not even close."While
the McConniels said Lauren's significant weight loss came during her
final weeks, Laskey testified Tuesday that the girl's extreme emaciation
would have been the result of malnutrition suffered over an extended
period.The
pediatrician called forced exercise -- which witnesses have said
Brittany McConniel and Lee used as another method to punish Lauren -- a
form of "torture."She
also said she suspected "punishment" might have been a factor in the
events that led to Lauren's ingestion of a fatal amount of salt.Asked by public defender Zaki Ali who had inflicted Lauren's bruises or given her the salt, Laskey responded, "I don't know."But
the pediatrician said she was "fairly clearly told that Brittany was
the primary caregiver for Lauren, because Ryan was always at work or at
school."Laskey
also said when she questioned the McConniels about what adults lived in
their home, neither mentioned their housemates the Lees -- Robert E.
Lee; his wife, Angela, who is the defendant's mother, and their other
adult daughter.In
her 2010 statement to police, Brittany McConniel said that Robert E.
Lee repeatedly molested her for about a decade beginning when she was 5
years old.

http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110518/NEWS01/105180339/Forensic-expert-Lauren-McConniel-suffered-inflicted-trauma-

Jury quickly finds Brittany McConniel guilty of neglect
May 20, 2011
Comments
McConniel found guilty (05.19.11)
McConniel found guilty (05.19.11): A jury took less than two hours to find Brittany McConniel guilty of child neglect, resulting in death. By LATHAY PEGUES
Written by
DOUGLAS WALKER
Brittany McConniel is led to jail by court guard Rory Hughes after being found guilty. / Kurt Hostetler / The Star Press

MUNCIE -- This week, Michele Maddox listened again to the message she intends to keep on her answering machine forever.

"Hi, Nannie. I love you. I call back in little bit."

The voice is that of Lauren McConniel, who was living with her mother in Tennessee when she left that message at her grandmother's Marion home.

On Thursday afternoon, a Delaware Circuit Court 5 jury deliberated for less than 90 minutes before finding Lauren's stepmother, Brittany McConniel, guilty of neglect of a dependent resulting in death.

Testimony during the nine-day trial indicated that after Lauren was removed from her mother's home in August 2009, she became dangerously emaciated -- and was subjected, at the very least, to physical abuse that some witnesses described as torture -- in the seven months she would spend in the custody of McConniel and the girl's father, Ryan.

The 5-year-old girl, described as little more than "skin and bones" in her last days, died in Riley Hospital for Children on March 9, 2010. Lauren's death was attributed to her as-yet-unexplained ingestion of a lethal amount of table salt, causing seizures and brain injuries from which her malnourished body could not recover.

"There is no excuse for the horror and the terror that (Brittany McConniel) and Ryan and the rest of the idiots in that house put Lauren through before her lonely death," Delaware County Prosecutor Jeffrey Arnold told jurors in his closing remarks.

Brittany McConniel -- who winced as Judge Thomas Cannon Jr. read the guilty verdict shortly after 3 p.m. but otherwise remained composed as she was handcuffed and led from the courtroom -- will face a maximum 50-year prison term when she is sentenced on June 13.

The 25-year-old defendant did not testify this week, although jurors watched a recording of an interview Muncie police conducted with McConniel while Lauren was in her final hours.

Ryan McConniel -- who struck a deal with prosecutors and will plead guilty to a neglect charge carrying up to 20 years in prison -- testified against his now-ex-wife last week, maintaining the defendant and her stepfather, Robert E. Lee, had punished Lauren by beating her hands and the soles of her feet and forcing her to exercise. A forensic pediatrician testified Tuesday that the victim's bruises and fractures appeared to support those claims.

(Page 2 of 3)

'Lie after lie after lie'

With Lauren and three other children in their care, the McConniels shared a South Ebright Street house with Lee -- arrested in 2002 after Brittany said he had been sexually abusing her for more than a decade -- as well as Lee's wife and their adult daughter.

In his closing remarks, Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman said Brittany McConniel "beat, tortured, starved and neglected that 5-year-old girl," putting Lauren "in an early grave."

Hoffman noted testimony that McConniel repeatedly told health care providers treating Lauren for lesser ailments that a Winchester physician was already taking steps to address the girl's emaciated condition.

"She told lie after lie after lie," said Hoffman.

The deputy prosecutor at one point pointed to McConniel, saying, "You had the duty to protect (Lauren) and you miserably failed." The defendant showed no visible reaction.

"Lauren McConniel didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell" of surviving the starvation and abuse in a "house of horror," Hoffman told jurors, adding that while there was no way to undo the harm done to Lauren and those who loved her, "a little bit of justice will go a long way."
'Broadway-quality showmanship'

Public defender Zaki Ali told jurors he "cannot make excuses for Brittany," but suggested his client was one of several individuals "who failed Lauren McConniel."

He said his client and her then-husband lacked "the sense and wherewithal" to pursue treatment for Lauren's deteriorating health. The attorney also suggested prosecutors also should have pursued charges against agencies and institutions -- including Ball Memorial Hospital and Meridian Services -- that he said had failed to adequately respond to warning signs in time to save Lauren's life.

"Did they not see this child was in distress?" Ali asked.

Ali also sat down in a chair in front of jurors and announced he was portraying his client's stepfather, and alleged sexual abuser, Robert E. Lee.

"I molested Brittany when she was 5 until she was in her early teens," said Ali, playing Lee. "When they moved into the house, I saw another victim, and that was Lauren."

(Page 3 of 3)

The attorney went on to suggest Lauren's fatal dose of salt had been administered by Lee, whom Ali called a "dirtbag."

Ali concluded by urging the jury to not reach a verdict in McConniel's case, because "you don't have all the pieces in the puzzle."

Prosecutor Arnold then sarcastically praised Ali's "perhaps Broadway-quality showmanship," assuring jurors the investigation of the events leading to Lauren's death was ongoing.

"Several people did fail Lauren, especially in the last 30 days of her life," he told jurors. "Are you going to add yourself to that list of names (by not convicting McConniel)?"

Arnold said health-care providers who could have helped Lauren were "lied to, over and over and over again," by the McConniels.

He urged the jurors not only to return a guilty verdict, but to "do it swiftly." They began their deliberations at 1:35 p.m. and had a verdict by 3 p.m., also eating lunch during that period.

Arnold later said the verdict came "pretty quick for a two-week trial, but the evidence is overwhelming."

'It warms my heart'
After the verdict was announced, Lauren's mother, Amber Huggins, shed tears as she displayed photographs of what appeared to be a healthy and happy child.

Huggins -- who had attended the trial with her husband, Jackie, and her parents, Michele and Glenn Maddox -- said the experience had been "a roller coaster of emotions."

The mother also said she hoped Lauren's story would prompt others to report suspected child abuse and neglect. "It is our responsibility to protect our children," she said.

Whatever resolution McConniel's conviction -- and any in the future -- might bring, there will always be a void in her family, Huggins said. "I have two children left, and four stepchildren. (But) my life's not complete without my little girl."

Her family said Lauren would live on in their memories and their hearts.

And Michele Maddox also has that phone message from the little girl who liked to give her grandmother drawings to display on her refrigerator.

"Most days it still hurts," Maddox said. "But the love of her voice, it warms my heart."

Contact Douglas Walker at 213-5851.



http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110520/NEWS01/105200311/1002/rss

The video with the good news:
Jury convicts Muncie stepmom in death of 5-year-old girl
http://www.fox59.com/videobeta/?watchId=f12ba6ac-f113-46a1-8c96-e444b5e43572

Muncie woman guilty of girl's death

Updated: Thursday, 19 May 2011, 4:31 PM EDT
Published : Thursday, 19 May 2011, 4:31 PM EDT

MUNCIE, Ind. (WISH) - Muncie mother Brittany McConniel was found guilty of child neglect Thursday follwing the 2010 death of her 5-year-old step-daughter.

Both Brittany and the child’s biological father Ryan McConniel.are charged with neglect in connection her death.

According to detectives and doctors at Riley Hospital for Children, 5-year-old Lauren McConniel may have suffered physical and possibly sexual abuse and neglect before dying at the hospital in March. Since then detectives have been looking at Lauren’s Father Ryan McConniel and Step-Mother Brittany McConniel and the role they may have played in her death.


http://www.wishtv.com/dpp/news/local/north_central/muncie-woman-guilty-of-girls-death?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+WISHTV_News+%28WISHTV.com+|+Indianapolis%2C+IN+-+News%29

Stepmother Convicted In Girl's Malnourishment Death
Police: 5-Year-Old Died Of Malnourishment, Salt Poisoning

POSTED: 5:23 pm EDT May 19, 2011

MUNCIE, Ind. -- A 25-year-old Muncie woman has been found guilty of neglect of a dependent causing death after her 5-year-old stepdaughter died of malnourishment and salt poisoning.

Brittany McConniel and her husband, Ryan McConniel, were charged last year, months after their stepdaughter, Lauren McConniel, died Riley Hospital for Children on March 9.

Police said the couple lied to investigators about seeking timely medical treatment for Lauren, who they contended displayed psychotic behavior.

The girl had been taken to a mental health facility for evaluation. She wasn't speaking much and had been put back in a diaper at age 5, police said.

According to the probable cause affidavit, the McConniels told authorities that the girl would store food in her cheeks, mutilate her toys, bite herself and her siblings to the point of bleeding and that she stared at the wall saying, "I hate myself."

The couple also told police that the girl ate food out of the trash and consumed her own vomit, but authorities allege that they didn't tell doctors about her bizarre behavior.

According to police reports, bizarre behavior preceded the girl's death. In one instance, the McConniels took her to a Muncie church, where a youth minister tried to get her to come inside for a party, but the child swore at the minister, authorities said.

Investigators said Lauren had extremely high levels of salt in her system and that there was evidence of physical trauma at the time of her death.

Prior to August 2009, the girl lived with her birth mother in Tennessee and was in good health, police said.

Brittany McConniel's sentencing is set for next month. She could receive up to 50 years in prison.



http://www.theindychannel.com/news/27956266/detail.html

Muncie stepmom found guilty of child neglect in death of 5-year-old
A Muncie woman was found guilty Thursday of child neglect in connection with the death of her five-year-old stepdaughter. Brittany McConniel faces 20 to 50 years in prison.

By Ann Keil Fox59

3:27 p.m. EDT, May 19, 2011
Muncie, Ind.—
A Muncie woman was found guilty Thursday of child neglect in connection with the death of her five-year-old stepdaughter. Brittany McConniel faces 20 to 50 years in prison.

Five-year-old Lauren McConniel died at Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis six days after being taken to the hospital in March 2010. She died as the result of brain damage and an unexplained ingestion of a lethal dose of salt. A forensic pediatrician also testified that Lauren's condition was the result of malnutrition over a period of time. Doctors said Lauren also had several bruises on her body.

"There is nothing this child could have done to deserve what was done to her," said Amber Higgins, Lauren's biological mother.

"I would have loved to make this into a murder case but there was no way we could prove Lauren ingested that salt on her own," Prosecutor Jeff Arnold said.


The prosecutor said evidence proved there was severe and persistent abuse and neglect in the home. Reports revealed Lauren had been acting out possibly as a result of sexual abuse. She would mutilate her dolls, bit herself and her siblings, rock back and forth for hours while repeating the phrase 'I hate myself.' Lauren also reportedly ate out of trash cans, would throw up and then eat her vomit and even ate her own feces.

McConniel's attorney said while his client may have neglected Lauren, someone else in the home may have been sexually abusing her. The same man he said molested Brittany as a child.

"I think she is a scapegoat and I think there are other people out there that should have been charged," said Zaki Ali, McConniel's attorney.

Lauren's mother said she is waiting for additional charges. She claimed justice has not been served following the conviction.

"I would have rather they did it to me instead of my daughter, any child not just my daughter any child. No child deserves this," Higgins said.

Lauren was placed in the custody of her father, Ryan McConniel, and Brittany in 2009. Ryan McConniel testified against his now former wife as part of a guilty plea to a lesser charge of neglect. He faces a maximum of 20 years in prison. He told jurors Brittany McConniel and her stepfather, Robert Lee, had punished his daughter by beating her with wooden sticks.

Other people may soon face charges in the girl's death.

Brittany McConniel will be sentenced June 13.

http://www.fox59.com/news/wxin-brittany-mcconniel-muncie-stepmom-found-guilty-of-in-death-of-5yearold-20110519,0,500099.story?track=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+fox59%2FstPj+%28WXIN+-+Fox+59+Local+News%29

Local News
Stepmother Convicted In Girl's Malnourishment Death
Story posted 2011.05.19 at 05:23 PM EDT

6 NEWS on the Go News

A 25-year-old Muncie woman has been found guilty of neglect of a dependent causing death after her 5-year-old stepdaughter died of malnourishment and salt poisoning.

Brittany McConniel and her husband, Ryan McConniel, were charged last year, months after their stepdaughter, Lauren McConniel, died Riley Hospital for Children on March 9.

Police said the couple lied to investigators about seeking timely medical treatment for Lauren, who they contended displayed psychotic behavior.

The girl had been taken to a mental health facility for evaluation. She wasn't speaking much and had been put back in a diaper at age 5, police said.

According to the probable cause affidavit, the McConniels told authorities that the girl would store food in her cheeks, mutilate her toys, bite herself and her siblings to the point of bleeding and that she stared at the wall saying, "I hate myself."

The couple also told police that the girl ate food out of the trash and consumed her own vomit, but authorities allege that they didn't tell doctors about her bizarre behavior.

According to police reports, bizarre behavior preceded the girl's death. In one instance, the McConniels took her to a Muncie church, where a youth minister tried to get her to come inside for a party, but the child swore at the minister, authorities said.

Investigators said Lauren had extremely high levels of salt in her system and that there was evidence of physical trauma at the time of her death.

Prior to August 2009, the girl lived with her birth mother in Tennessee and was in good health, police said.

Brittany McConniel's sentencing is set for next month. She could receive up to 50 years in prison.


Story posted 2011.05.19 at 05:23 PM EDT

http://localwireless.com/wap/news/text.jsp?sid=35&nid=49444075&cid=52&scid=-1&ith=1&title=Local+News

McConniel jurors to begin deliberations today
May 19, 2011
28 Comments
Written by
DOUGLAS WALKER

MUNCIE -- Brittany McConniel took the witness stand Wednesday, but only to say that she had decided not to testify in her soon-to-be concluded neglect trial.

Testifying outside the presence of jurors -- who are expected to begin their deliberations in the case by mid-day today -- the 25-year-old defendant agreed with public defender Zaki Ali's assessment that she had planned to testify as recently as Tuesday night and that they had prepared extensively for her appearance on the witness stand.

Ali asked McConniel to confirm, on the record, that she had since changed her mind about responding to allegations stemming from the March 2010 death of her 5-year-old stepdaughter, Lauren.

"I do not want to take the stand," Brittany McConniel said.

As a result, Ali's entire defense consisted of the brief testimony of only one witness: Samra "Jo-Jo" Lee, the defendant's half-sister.

And all Lee did was provide Ali with 24 photographs she had taken of Lauren McConniel and other family members between August 2009 and January 2010.

Lauren, then 5 years old, died in March 2010. Witnesses have said she was extremely emaciated, with virtually no body fat, when brought to Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis six days before her death. Authorities said her death was the result of brain damage caused by the unexplained ingestion of a lethal dose of salt.

A forensic pediatrician on Tuesday testified that the girl's condition reflected she suffered from malnutrition for an extended period. Lauren was described as healthy and happy in August 2009, when her father, Ryan, removed her from the custody of her mother, who lives in Tennessee.

She spent her remaining seven months in the care of her father and stepmother, in a South Ebright Street home also occupied by Brittany's McConniel's mother, sister and stepfather, a man Brittany McConniel says had molested her repeatedly while she was growing up.

Delaware County Prosecutor Jeffrey Arnold on Wednesday was apparently referring to Samra Lee's presence in the home where Lauren wasted away when he asked the witness, "Did you have a chance to have a good breakfast this morning?"

(Page 2 of 2)

That question drew an objection from defense attorney Ali.

Judge Thomas Cannon Jr. allowed the question to stand, however, and Lee said she had not yet had a chance to eat breakfast.

"I bet you don't miss many meals, then, do you?" Arnold responded.

One of Lee's photographs showed Lauren with Brittany McConniel's son from a previous relationship, who also lived with the family. Arnold said that boy "doesn't look like he misses too many meals, either."

After six days of testimony, Arnold and Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman had rested the state's case Wednesday morning without calling additional witnesses.

Ali rested his case after Lee's brief appearance on the witness stand.

Judge Cannon told the jury -- made up of seven men and five women -- that after closing arguments by attorneys, set to begin about 8:30 a.m. today -- they would be given the case to deliberate.

If convicted of neglect of a dependent resulting in death, a Class A felony, McConniel would face a maximum 50-year prison term.

Ryan McConniel last week testified against his now-former wife, and has agreed to plead guilty to a neglect charge carrying a possible 20-year sentence.

He told jurors that Brittany McConniel and her stepfather, Robert Lee, repeatedly punished Lauren by beating her hands and the soles of her feet with wooden sticks, a claim also made 14 months earlier by other children in the home.

The Riley Hospital pediatrician who testified Tuesday said bruises on the girl's body were consistent with those accounts.

Contact Douglas Walker at 213-5851.

http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110519/BUSTED/105190343

Justice can be a tricky thing
May 22, 2011
9 Comments
Written by
LISA NELLESSEN-LARA


Justice.

That one word was bantered about in the courtroom, in local homes, in workplaces, and in my own newsroom this week. In fact, it's the headline we went with Friday after the conviction of Brittany McConniel, who jurors believed neglected and tortured 5-year-old Lauren McConniel, which eventually led to her agonizing death.

This case fascinated readers from the moment they learned little Lauren died at Riley Hospital in Indianapolis, just 26 pounds at the time of her death. On the surface, there appeared to have been so many missed opportunities for health-care workers, law enforcement and neighbors to have intervened. But Ryan and Brittany McConniel wove a very tangled web of clever lies that led a series of very educated and dedicated professionals to believe this incredibly "sick" young girl was being treated.

Because, really, who could ever imagine such evil?

What rational human being could imagine anyone intentionally starving an innocent child? Torturing that child? Driving that child to the point of absolute exhaustion? It's so evil it's unimaginable.

That's the thing about good people -- we simply can't imagine the horrors that surely went on in the McConniel home.

And based on testimony of other children in the home -- and Ryan McConniel himself -- it was a house of horrors. And like many such houses, it's only when the worst happens and a child succumbs to the horror, that it ends.

Too late for Lauren, but not too late for the next victim of Brittany McConniel. Because surely there would have been a new target of Brittany's twisted psyche. Does that help Lauren's mother, Amber Huggins? I think it does. Because that's the type of person she is. And we have a hard time accepting that, too.

The Facebook and story chat comments showed a community that was, understandably, enraged at Brittany McConniel. There was no end to the suggestions of punishments for the "wicked stepmother." Torture. Death. Eternal suffering.

Amber, however, quietly thanked the community for their support. She wasted no words on the woman who tortured her precious daughter. Brittany McConniel's conviction is the beginning of healing, Amber says, although she'll never feel "complete" again. On Thursday, she focused on the little girl at the center of the firestorm.

"I am very proud that, even after death, Lauren's light is still touching people across the world," she wrote to The Star Press.

That's the mom Lauren deserved to spend her life with.

Has there been justice for Lauren? Somewhat. At least one of her torturers will likely spend the rest of her life in prison. Her father, who reportedly stood by and watched it happen and participated in the lies to cover it up, will face a judge as well. I believe prosecutors and investigators won't let this case rest until everyone has been punished.

But justice for Lauren? I just don't know.

Lisa Nellessen-Lara is executive editor of The Star Press. Have a question for her? Want to learn more about the day-to-day workings of The Star Press?

http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110522/OPINION/105220323

WALKER/ROYSDON REPORT: Lawsuits likely to fly in wake of Brittany McConniel trial testimony
May 23, 2011
Written by
Douglas Walker and Keith Roysdon

The events leading to last year's tragic death of 5-year-old Lauren McConniel, described in at-times harrowing detail in the recently concluded trial of her stepmother, seem destined to result in the filing of one or more lawsuits, perhaps against some major players on the local stage.

Attorneys who represented Lauren's mother last year in her successful efforts to regain custody of an older daughter sat in on much of the trial of Brittany McConniel, who faces up to 50 years in prison after being found guilty of a neglect charge stemming from Lauren's death.

Those lawyers have also reportedly pursued copies of Muncie Police Department reports on the case.

Any litigation would likely focus on Lauren's visits -- during the seven months she lived in Muncie with her father, Ryan, and her stepmother -- to St. Vincent Randolph Hospital in Winchester and three Muncie health facilities: A southside urgent care clinic, a Meridian Services office and Ball Memorial Hospital.

Testimony indicated that while Lauren was receiving unrelated treatment -- or, in the case of Meridian, counseling -- during the weeks she was becoming severely emaciated, the McConniels assured those health-care providers that she was already being treated for weight-related issues by a Winchester physician.

Unfortunately, those claims were false, and the extended period the girl suffered from malnourishment, as well as physical abuse, was a factor in her March 2010 death.

Brittany McConniel's public defender, Zaki Ali, went so far during his closing argument to jurors on Thursday as to suggest that some health-care providers should be facing criminal prosecution, alongside the McConniels, for not alerting authorities to Lauren's condition.

(A nurse-practitioner at the urgent care center did refer Lauren to Meridian Services, saying she was displaying possible signs of sexual abuse. And a Meridian counselor tried to bring her concerns to the attention of welfare authorities, and to set up an appointment with a pediatrician for the ailing child.)

(Page 2 of 2)

Witnesses said Lauren was treated at BMH for a possible head injury less than 12 hours before the McConniels delivered the girl, by then near death, to Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis.

There was some disagreement in the Muncie hospital's emergency room that day over whether to conduct blood tests on Lauren. Ultimately that procedure wasn't pursued.

What's uncertain is whether Lauren ingested a lethal amount of salt, which hours later would cause the seizures and brain injuries that led to her death, before or after that mid-day trip to BMH.

One of the jurors who last Thursday convicted Brittany McConniel commented on that part of Lauren's saga in an e-mail exchange with The Walker/Roysdon Report.

"We hope no other child will face the same lack of action exhibited by so many in the health care field," wrote juror Jim Schenkel. "Lies or truth from care-givers not withstanding, they should always follow up when presented with signs of abuse as they were with Lauren.

"We need to expect better from the professionals we entrust with the care of our children."

In his closing remarks, Delaware County Prosecutor Jeffrey Arnold discounted Ali's suggestion that the service providers should face criminal charges, saying the physicians, nurses and counselors were "lied to, over and over and over again."

Arnold said Ali was trying to "blame everybody else, (to) get the blame off of Brittany."

And the prosecutor said such questions about the responsibilities of health professionals would be more appropriately resolved through civil litigation.

They probably will be.

Tragedies linked

While the circumstances were substantially different, the 1994 slaying of a Muncie man as he walked through a city park drew local concern and outrage much as the death of Lauren McConniel would more than 15 years later.

In August 1994, 44-year-old Donald Shreves was walking through Heekin Park when he was approached by four teenagers, who asked him for a cigarette.

When he ignored that request, the youths literally stomped Shreves to death, kicking and beating their victim to the degree he was left with a broken nose, jaw and 13 ribs.

As it turns out, Lauren McConniel and Donald Shreves are members of the same extended family.

Lauren's father -- Ryan McConniel, who is set to plead guilty to a neglect charge that could send him to prison for up to 20 years -- is the nephew of the late Donald Shreves.

Brittany McConniel, meanwhile, has a connection to three members of that extended family, who are all first cousins of one another.

She is the stepdaughter of one of those cousins, whom she had accused of sexually abusing her during her childhood; bore a child to a second, and married a third in Ryan McConniel.

http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110523/NEWS01/105230309/1002/rss

Banditbird, your updates are truly appreciated. Have you come across any reason for little Lauren being taken from her mother in the first place? It seems she was happy and healthy at that time. I am so furious that the "father" who took this child from her mother (and apparently did not want her as "he was at work all the time or school") was allowed to make a deal. She was his daughter, his little girl. How sadistic to know this was happening and not stop it. Why didn't he just let her go back with her mom, or grandmother since all agree she deteriorated after being taken away. Duh, that is kind of understandable.

There is a saying I came across that sort of explains why the mother not having custody is so perplexing in this case. In Indiana, mothers traditionally have custody of their children unless the mother is nuts or a slut. Kind of graphic, but I think that is why the custody issue keeps popping up.

Amber Huggins is neither of those things and is actually a very loving mother.

When I began researching this case, one of the first things I wanted to know was why on earth the father had custody -- and it was all because of money. Ryan McConniel had it and Amber Huggins did not. After Lauren's birth, the marriage really hit the skids and Amber wanted to file for divorce. Ryan told her not to worry about it -- hey, no rush, right? She was saving money for a lawyer when he slapped her with divorce papers. He had a fancy $ lawyer and filed the divorce in White County Arkansas. Amber wasn't a resident of Arkansas so she didn't qualify for legal aid and Tennessee (where Amber was living) would NT fund a divorce action out of state so she was left to represent herself. Ryan (who was already with Brittany Lee) sued for custody of Lauren and Kaylynn and it was in the hopes of forcing Amber to pay child support to Ryan and Brittany. Amber won visitation rights (which enraged Ryan) and insisted Ryan abide by the terms of the agreement. He and Brittany disappeared with the girls and his relatives helped keep their location secret from Amber. Any time Amber managed to make contact, she pushed the custody issue -- she planned a re-match in court -- and Ryan would just vanish again. It was putting a cramp in their plans to get money from Amber; every time they made contact, Amber was waiting with the court ordered visitation documents.

The bottom line was that when Ryan came on August 23, 2010, to take Lauren back, Amber had no choice but to let him take her, but she insisted Ryan register his address with the local police so that she could contact her girls. He registered a false address and telephone number. When she showed up for her girls and the court papers, and the local police as backup, she found out that no one lived at the address at the present time and that Brittany and Ryan had NEVER resided at the address provided. When she got back home, the police told her that she now had actionable grounds to sue Ryan as he was blatantly not abiding by the terms of the custody agreement. She was busy working on the papers to engage the ass-hat in court when they telephoned her and told her that Lauren was in the hospital -- dying. She got there and spent the next five days praying for a miracle but it was not to be. Little Lauren's body could not recover from the months of abuse she had endured.

That it all boiled down to money from start to finish is hideously sad. Lauren was deeply loved by Amber, Kaylynn, and all members of her family -- on the mother's side anyway.

Here is an earlier article about Amber - I already posted this (I think) on page 1, but I highlighted the part that's applicable to Amber and why she didn't have custody.

Mother "broken" after five year-old daughter's death
The mother of a little girl in Muncie who died of malnutrition, has strong words for Central Indiana: "Do not let this happen to another kid."
6:21 p.m. EDT, June 17, 2010
Indianapolis—
The mother of a little girl who died of malnutrition, has strong words for Central Indiana: "Do not let this happen to another kid."
That was the message from five-yea-old Lauren McConniel's mother Amber Huggins. Higgins spoke via phone to Fox59 News Thursday.
Huggins made a desperate plea to the public saying, "To everybody, if you ever see a child that you think is being abused, even if you have your doubts, please contact Child Protective Services."
Huggins lives in Knoxville, Tennessee. She said she lost custody of Lauren to her ex-husband Ryan McConniel who is now being bars along with his wife Brittany. Both are charged with Class A Felony counts of neglect, causing Lauren's death.

According to Huggins, "The only reason that she [Lauren] ended out of my custody is because when I went to my divorce proceeding, I did not have an attorney to represent me. I mean you've got your children and you're a good mother of them and a judge says, 'Alright, wer'e going to give custody to the dad.' "

A detective with the Muncie Police Department said the custody battle took place in Arkansas. On Amber Huggins' Myspace page, she lists her status as "broken." She said her daughter was in perfect health before Ryan McConniel received custody.

"She was perfect. She had an upper respiratory infection once. Other than that, she was in perfect health from the minute of her birth," said Huggins.

http://www.fox59.com/news/wxin-amber-huggins-speaks-muncie-death-061710,0,997007.story

Here's an early article; I think it has been archived.

Amber Huggins, Lauren McConniel's mother, spent six months trying to find daughters
By SETH SLABAUGH • • June 18, 2010

MUNCIE -- The biological mother of Lauren McConniel says she lost custody of the girl because she couldn't afford an attorney. She also says she pleaded unsuccessfully with the girl's father and stepmother -- via e-mail -- to tell her where they were living in the months before Lauren's death.

"I was kept from my daughter for six months," said Amber Huggins, a Marion native now living in Knoxville, Tenn. "I looked everywhere for them (Lauren and her 9-year-old sister) for six months."

Five-year-old Lauren's father, Ryan McConniel, and stepmother, Brittany McConniel, have been charged with felony neglect of a dependent resulting in Lauren's death on March 9.

Amber and Ryan's divorce decree in White County, Ark., granted Ryan custody of both girls in 2007.

"I did not have the financial resources to have an attorney," Amber said this week in a telephone interview. "Ryan had an attorney and I did not. There was no other reason he got custody. I was not an unfit mother. I never hurt my children."

Ryan kept the older daughter, but let Amber have Lauren starting at Christmas of 2008 after Amber filed a complaint of child abuse.

"She had bruises on her," Amber said. "I asked her what happened and she said she didn't know. I took pictures of the bruises but they were old and not good quality pictures. Child protective services in White County said it was not enough."

Amber had Lauren until August 2009 when Ryan took her back. He gave Knoxville police an address in Winchester where he said he would be living.

But Amber later traveled to Winchester, and, accompanied by the police, went to the address Ryan had provided to Knoxville police.

Nobody had lived at the address in a long time.

"I sent numerous e-mails begging them to give me their address," Amber said. "I was told they were living in Winchester. I heard they were living in Farmland. I heard Fort Wayne. I heard Muncie. I heard everything."

Amber said Ryan and Brittany responded by e-mail that she could see the girls when they got old enough to decide for themselves if they wanted to see her.

"I went to the Muncie police the same day I went to Winchester," Amber said. "They told me to file contempt charges against Ryan (for denying her court-ordered visitation rights). I was in the process of filing contempt charges when I got the phone call that Lauren was in the hospital."

Ryan, Brittany and the two girls had been living with Brittany's sister, Samra Lee, and Brittany's mother and stepfather, Angie and Robert E. Lee, on South Ebright Street.

"My daughter was alive and perfectly happy and normal and healthy when she was with me," Amber said. "She was a normal delivery, a normal pregnancy and a normal daughter. I should be signing her up for kindergarten and she should be cheerleading."

After Lauren's death, child protective services removed the 9-year-old from Ryan and Brittany's custody and placed her in foster care.

On March 19, Muncie attorney Kimberly Dowling, representing Amber, filed a petition for emergency custody of the 9-year-old, who now lives with Amber. The petition said Lauren was emaciated, significantly bruised and had elevated salt levels in her blood when she died.

"Child protective services in Arkansas was involved in December of 2008 or January of 2009 over allegations that Lauren had bruises," said Muncie police Sgt. Jimmy Gibson. "They investigated it, and I believe it was reported by the father and stepmother that Lauren was now living with the bio-mom, so the case was closed. The father and stepmother reported that Lauren had bumped into a trash can. The bio-mom had pictures of bruising but I think they were taken with a cell phone and weren't very good."

The Lees remain under investigation by Gibson for failure to report child abuse and neglect.

"Hopefully, some family might come forward and have a conscience and do the right thing," Gibson said. "The uncle next door threatened to call child protective services but never did."

Angie Lee gave police a statement, while Samra Lee declined to be interviewed, according to Gibson. Robert E. Lee went in for a police interview but reported he was hurting and ended up putting himself in the hospital, according to Gibson. "He said he needed to leave and never came back."



http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20100618/NEWS01/6180307/Amber-Huggins-Lauren-McConniel-s-mother-spent-six-months-trying-to-find-daughters

Brittany McConniel's sentencing hearing postponed
June 11, 2011
6 Comments
Written by
The Star Press

Brittany McConniel

The sentencing of Brittany McConniel, convicted of a neglect charge last month that stemmed from last year's death of her stepdaughter, has been postponed.

McConniel, 25, was scheduled to be sentenced Monday, but Delaware Circuit Court 5 Judge Thomas Cannon Jr. this week granted a continuance at the request of her public defender, Zaki Ali. The attorney asked that his client be examined by a psychiatrist or psychologist before being sentenced.

McConniel, 25, was scheduled to be sentenced Monday, but Delaware Circuit Court 5 Judge Thomas Cannon Jr. this week granted a continuance at the request of her public defender, Zaki Ali. The attorney asked that his client be examined by a psychiatrist or psychologist before being sentenced.

A jury found the Muncie woman guilty of a Class A felony carrying a standard 30-year prison term. She was accused of abusing and failing to seek appropriate medical treatment for 5-year-old Lauren McConniel, who was severely emaciated when she died on March 9, 2010.

http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110611/NEWS01/106110333/Brittany-McConniel-s-sentencing-hearing-postponed?odyssey=mod|newswell|text|Frontpage

MUNCIE -- With her father and stepmother already facing long prison
terms, authorities aren't letting up in their investigation of the
events that led to the March 2010 death of Lauren McConniel.On
Tuesday, a third adult who lived in the South Ebright Street house
where 5-year-old Lauren spent her final months was arrested on charges
stemming from her mistreatment and death.

Robert
E. Lee, 44 -- the stepfather of Brittany McConniel, Lauren's stepmother
-- is charged with aiding, inducing or causing neglect of a dependent, a
Class A felony carrying a standard 30-year prison term; three counts of
battery, a Class D felony with a standard 18-month sentence, and
failure to immediately report child abuse, a misdemeanor.Lee,
listed on court records at addresses in both Muncie and Farmland, was
arrested late Tuesday afternoon, and was being held without bond in the
Delaware County jail.Details
of the allegations against Lee were not available Tuesday night,
although more information was expected today after related court
documents are unsealed."I'll
spend the rest of my career, and all the resources of our office,
chasing down and investigating anybody who had anything to do with (the
abuse and death of) Lauren McConniel, and get them in front of a jury,"
Delaware County Prosecutor Jeffrey Arnold said Tuesday night. "If you
were involved in that, look over your shoulder, because I'm coming."Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman called the case "an active, ongoing investigation."To those who followed last month's trial of Brittany McConniel, Lee's arrest can't come as a complete shock.Testimony
indicated that after Lauren was removed from her mother's home in
August 2009, the girl became dangerously emaciated -- and was subjected
to sadistic forms of physical abuse --in the seven months she would
spend in the custody of her father, Ryan, and her stepmother, Brittany.Lee, his wife and their adult daughter also lived with the McConniels.Lauren
died in Riley Hospital for Children on March 9, 2010, apparently after
her as-yet-unexplained ingestion of a lethal amount of table salt, which
caused seizures and brain injuries her malnourished body could not
recover from.
Ryan McConniel -- who had struck a deal with prosecutors to plead
guilty to a neglect charge that could send him to prison for 20 years --
testified that both his wife and Lee routinely punished Lauren by
beating her hands and the soles of her feet and forcing her to exercise.A
jury on May 19 deliberated for less than 90 minutes before finding
Brittany McConniel guilty of neglect of a dependent. She will face up to
50 years in prison when she is sentenced by Judge Thomas Cannon Jr.Sentencing hearings for the McConniels have not yet been scheduled.Deputy
Prosecutor Hoffman had said during Brittany McConniel's trial that it
was "only round one," apparently referring to future prosecutions.It was not immediately clear whether Lee's arrest Tuesday was the result of a grand jury investigation.Lee
and his daughter were observed about two weeks ago sitting in a
Delaware County Building hallway near the room where local grand juries
convene.Lee was
arrested by Wabash County authorities in 2002 after he was accused of
sexually abusing Brittany, then in her mid-teens, for as long as a
decade.However,
court records reflect Lee in that case was convicted only of a
misdemeanor count of battery, resulting in a 45-day jail term.

http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20110622/BUSTED/106220321

just shoot these ppl!!!

MUNCIE — Nearly two years after the death of 5-year-old Lauren
McConniel, two more arrests were made Monday in connection with the
abuse and neglect of the Muncie girl.Angela
Rice Lee, 45, is charged with aiding, inducing or causing neglect of a
dependent, a Class A felony carrying a standard 30-month prison term,
and failure to immediately report child abuse or neglect, a misdemeanor.
Lee — the mother of Brittany Lee McConniel, Lauren’s stepmother — was being held without bond in the Delaware County jail.
Also arrested was Angela Lee’s other daughter, Samra Lee, 21.
The
younger Lee faces the same charges as her mother, although the aiding
and inducing charge is a Class D felony with a standard 18-month
sentence.
Samra Lee was apparently in police custody on
Monday night, but she had not been booked into the Delaware County jail
as of 8 p.m.
Court documents related to the charges had
been sealed, and details of the allegations against the women were not
immediately available.
With Monday’s arrests, all five
adults who lived in the South Ebright House where Lauren McConniel spent
her final months have now been charged in connection with her death.
Last
May, Brittany McConniel, now 26, was found guilty of neglect of a
dependent resulting in death. She was later sentenced to 50 years in
prison by Delaware Circuit Court 5 Judge Thomas Cannon Jr.
Testimony
during that trial indicated that after Lauren was removed from her
mother’s home in August 2009, she became dangerously emaciated. She also
was subjected to sadistic forms of abuse in the seven months she would
spend in the custody of her father, Ryan, and her stepmother.
Lauren
died in an Indianapolis hospital on March 9, 2010, after her apparent
ingestion of a lethal amount of table salt, which caused seizures and
brain injuries her malnourished body could not recover from.
http://www.thestarpress.com/article/20120123/BUSTED/120123019