Trial set for mother charged in autistic daughter’s death

[Guest guest]

http://www.galesburg.com/news/x1295927774

Trial set for mother charged in autistic daughter's death

Jan 04, 2008 @ 10:59 PM

The Associated Press

PEKIN -

Just days after she and her father moved back to the family home in

Morton, Ill., from North Carolina in May 2006, 3-year-old

McCarron was dead.

Police and prosecutors say the little girl's mother — a physician who

apparently was unable to cope with her daughter's severe autism —

suffocated her with a white plastic bag then tried to make it look

like an accident.

Opening statements in McCarron's trial are expected to begin Monday

in Tazewell County Circuit Court in Pekin, just southwest of Peoria,

where jurors could face a tough question: Was McCarron legally

responsible for her actions or was she insane?

McCarron, who is charged with two counts of first-degree murder and

has been free on bond since 2006, has been found mentally fit to

stand trial. But a medical expert hired by her attorneys said

McCarron was insane at the time of the killing. McCarron, who faces

up to 60 years in prison for each charge, has pleaded not guilty.

Much of the case could hinge on a videotaped confession that

McCarron gave on May 14, 2006, the day after her daughter's death.

McCarron was being treated at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center

in Peoria for her own attempted suicide.

On the hour-long tape, which a judge has said can be used in court

when her trial begins next week, McCarron said she wanted " a life

without autism. "

" Autism left me hollow, " she said. " It seems that everything I tried

to do didn't help her. She was a tough nut to crack, " McCarron said.

Lawyers on both sides of the case either declined comment this week

or did not return calls by The Associated Press seeking comment.

After her daughter was diagnosed with autism, McCarron became

well-known in a Peoria-area support group.

Dr. Ayoub, a leading supporter of a controversial theory that

mercury in early childhood vaccines causes the disease, said in 2006

interviews that he had occasionally talked with McCarron after

was diagnosed with autism.

" She was very dedicated to trying to get treatment for her daughter, "

Ayoub told Copley News service in one of those interviews. " I've met

with a lot of parents who are dealing with autistic children, and she

was one of the most loving mothers. "

McCarron and her husband, McCarron, decided in 2004 that

needed better medical care and found a clinic in North

Carolina that specialized in treating autism.

McCarron, a Caterpillar Inc. engineer, transferred to a new job

there and moved with the little girl. McCarron, a pathologist

who reportedly was unable to find a suitable job in North Carolina,

stayed behind with the couple's younger daughter, .

The separation, however, proved difficult for the family, so

McCarron -- planning to move back to Illinois in mid-2006 -- brought

home in early May, according to news reports after

's death.

But on May 13, prosecutors say, McCarron drove the little girl

to her parents' house, also in Morton, and suffocated her with a

plastic bag. McCarron reportedly told police she'd taken

for a drive to calm her after she couldn't get the little girl to

take a nap.

McCarron allegedly brought back home, carrying her past

family members as if the girl was asleep, and laid her down in a

bedroom. A while later, McCarron told family she couldn't wake her

daughter.

Emergency workers were called to the home to treat , who

wasn't breathing.

McCarron wasn't a suspect, according to police, until they were

called back to her house early the next day, after she tried to

overdose on over-the-counter drugs.

Police said they found McCarron and her husband, who had returned

from a business trip, hugging and crying. They say she'd just told

him she killed .

McCarron has since filed for divorce. Messages left for a

Morton, Ill., phone listed for him were not returned.

Tazewell County State's Attorney Umholtz called the

death " tragic " in a 2006 interview with Copley News Service.

" It's a terrible incident anytime a mother would be charged with

murdering her child, " he said.

But the little girl's her grandfather, McCarron, said

McCarron didn't lack for help in raising her daughter, whom he called

happy and playful.

" This was not a question of there's no place to turn, there's no

support, " McCarron told the Chicago Tribune. " This was not a

murder about autism. "