An Ohio mother who pleaded guilty to the murder of her 16-month-old daughter has been sentenced to life behind bars with no possibility of parole.
Kristel Candelario, 32, was charged with aggravated murder and child endangerment for leaving her daughter Jailyn in a playpen at home while she went on vacation for 10 days last summer.
When Candelario returned home from her trip to Detroit and Puerto Rico, she found Jailyn unresponsive and called police.
“Jailyn was extremely dehydrated at the time of death,” the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office wrote in a press release. “Jailyn was discovered in a Pack-N-Play pen on a liner soiled with urine and feces with soiled blankets.”
An autopsy determined that the toddler had died of starvation and severe dehydration.
Candelario pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and child endangerment last month as part of a plea deal with prosecutors, who agreed to dismiss two additional murder counts and a felonious assault charge.
During her sentencing hearing, County Common Pleas Court Judge Brendan Sheehan told Candelario she committed “the ultimate betrayal” by leaving her daughter alone without food.
“Just as you didn’t let Jailyn out of her confinement, so too you should spend the rest of your life in a cell without freedom,” Sheehan said. “The only difference will be, the prison will at least feed you and give you liquid that you denied her.”
Candelario, who has struggled with depression and related mental health issues, said she has prayed daily for forgiveness.
“There’s so much pain that I have in regards to the loss of my baby, Jailyn,” she said. “I’m extremely hurt about everything that happened. I am not trying to justify my actions, but nobody knew how much I was suffering and what I was going through. … God and my daughter have forgiven me.”
Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael C. O’Malley slammed Candelario’s actions as selfish in a Monday press release.
“Today, we remember Jailyn — a beautiful baby girl who was taken from this world due to her mother’s unimaginable selfishness. The thought of going on vacation for 10 days and leaving your child to starve to death in her Pack-N-Play is a new low in parental care.”
— With files from The Associated Press
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