the girl who inspired us all

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January 2020- 8-year-old Thomas died as a result of hypothermia after he was subjected to “freezing temperatures” in his unheated garage overnight.

Michael Valva, 40, a 15-year police veteran of the NYPD, and his fiancée, Angela Pollina, 42, were charged with second-degree murder in the Jan. 17 death of little Thomas Valva “because they engaged in conduct which created a grave risk of death to this child,” Suffolk County Police Commissioner Geraldine Hart told reporters during a press conference. Thomas “was subjected to freezing temperatures” in the “unheated garage” of the couple’s Center Moriches, Long Island, home “overnight” when the temps outside were a bone-chilling 19 degrees, Hart said. “We believe certainly that Thomas was kept in the garage overnight preceding his death,” the commissioner said.

Authorities responded to the home on Bittersweet Lane around 9:40 a.m. Jan. 17 after Valva reported that his son fell in the driveway while waiting for the school bus an hour earlier. Valva told cops thathis son lost consciousness after the fall and remained unconscious, according to Hart. “When officers arrived, Michael Valva was performing CPR on his son in the basement,” Hart said. Medics rushed the boy to Long Island Community Hospital and when he arrived there, his body temperature was just 76 degrees, according to Hart. He was pronounced dead at the hospital. Assistant District Attorney Kerriann Kelly detailed a series of allegations of physical and mental abuse towards Thomas, including throwing him down the stairs, locking him in a bedroom without a bathroom, depriving him of food, beating him with closed fists, and pulling hair from his head. The treatment of Thomas was callous, cruel and evil. Thomas and his older brother Anthony were severely undernourished and would eat food from garbage cans at their school and from under bleachers. The teachers would bring food and clothes for the boys, she said. Thomas and his brother Anthony had to sleep in the unheated garage of their home without blankets or pillows, and that the boys went to school with ice cold hands and cheeks. Thomas would often ask to spend recess indoors because he didn't want go outside. 

RIP  Angel

Palermo, N.Y. March 2022 — Oswego County parents of a 17-year-old boy with cerebral palsy who died have been charged in connection with his death, deputies said.

The boy was extremely underweight and had bedsores on “a significant portion” of his body, the Oswego County Sheriff’s Office announced Wednesday.

A medical examiner in February declared the death to be a homicide caused partly due to infection and malnutrition, deputies said.The boy became unresponsive and police were called to the home in Palermo on May 9, 2021, deputies He was taken to a hospital where he was soon pronounced dead.

In the months after his death investigators interviewed the boy’s teachers, doctors, parents, and physical and occupational therapists, deputies said. Records were obtained from medical institutions, schools, and other agencies involved with his care, deputies said.

Lisa and Anthony Waldron, the boy’s mother and stepfather, were arrested Wednesday, deputies said Wednesday.

They were both charged with second-degree manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and first-degree endangering the welfare of an incompetent or physically disabled person, deputies said.

RIP Angel

TOWN OF PALERMO, N.Y. (WSYR-TV) March 2022– Just six days before the tragic death of 17-year-old Jordan Brooks in Oswego County, another child’s death in the same town was ruled a homicide. 

Fifteen-month-old Galaxy Cruz died on November 9, 2020, her death was ruled a homicide. 

According to a May 2021 New York State Child Fatality Report her cause of death was multiple injuries with asphyxia by smothering. The report went on to say, “… all evidence suggested that the mother caused the child’s injuries and subsequently her death.” 

Oswego County Sheriff Don Hilton told NewsChannel 9 the mother is the main suspect but has not been charged yet. 

Daniel Cruz, the child’s biological father only saw his little girl a few times while he was serving out a sentence behind bars all of her short life. 

Galaxy was living in a Town of Palermo home with her mom, mother’s partner, and other family members at the time of her death. According to the report, the mother found Galaxy unresponsive face down in a portable crib the morning of November 9, 2020. The baby’s uncle called 911 while the mother performed CPR, later bringing the unresponsive child outside where a bystander helped to perform CPR. Rigor mortis had set it when EMS arrived a short time later and she was pronounced dead in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. 

“I don’t understand how a house full of people, five adults, but my 15-month-old daughter suffers crazy injuries, but no one knows how she passes, no one’s still in jail, I just don’t get it,” Cruz said. 

The autopsy revealed Galaxy’s face was discolored and bruised with fluid in her lungs and her arm and wrist were broken. 

“I just want the accountability, I had to pay for the crimes I did, I had to be accountable for that…I want someone to be accountable for my baby,” Cruz said. 

The report also states the mother’s partner completed a polygraph test where he appeared to be telling the truth when he said he didn’t cause the injuries to the child but he showed deception when he denied knowing who caused the injuries and death of the child. The mother refused to take a polygraph test at the advice of her attorney. 

RIP Angel

Neffy Harris, 5, died from being beaten, according to the Onondaga County Medical Examiner’s Office.

The office released the preliminary autopsy results confirming that the remains found Tuesday were that of Harris and that the immediate cause of death was multiple blunt force injuries.

Neffy’s mother, Latasha Mott, told police that she had beaten the girl with a belt in the shower until she died on Jan. 6, authorities said. Then she hid her body, eventually burying her in the woods off of Salt Springs Road, where police found her yesterday.

The medical examiner’s office also determined that the cause of death was a homicide.

Syracuse, N.Y. – Syracuse police are investigating the death of an 11-year-old boy who was hospitalized Thursday.

Around 1:10 p.m. Thursday, a 911 caller reported that the boy was in “full arrest” in a home on the 600 block of East Division Street, according to Onondaga County 911 Center dispatches.

When police arrived the child was unconscious and not breathing. He was in critical condition when he arrived at the hospital, police said.

The child, Ashton DeGonzaque, was pronounced dead hours later at Upstate University Hospital, according to a news release from Syracuse police Friday.

Police said Friday the cause of death is still under investigation.

Rykelan Brown, 4, had foster parents who loved him.

But Cortland County social services forced him to live with his biological father in DeWitt. The dad, Joshua Emmons, beat him to death in March 2024.

Nearly everyone wrestled with those truths in a small courtroom Tuesday in Syracuse as Rykelan’s killer — his own father, who had a history of abusive behavior — was sentenced to 25 years in prison for manslaughter.

“The truth is, we fought so hard to keep him safe,” foster mom Sam Adams said at Emmons’ sentencing. “It’s unbearable to think that he felt, for even one second, that he was unlovable or unwanted.”

Related article: ‘Daddy Josh hit me’: Child welfare workers ignored red flags and sent a boy to his death

Emmons, 27, of DeWitt, beat the preschooler so badly his brain bled. Emmons, who had pleaded guilty in August, showed no emotion during the half-hour sentencing and said nothing when given the chance.

In an interview with authorities before sentencing, Emmons offered no apologies for the beating, saying only that he’d been drinking alcohol the day he took his little boy’s life, the judge noted.

“No apology, no remorse, just some lame excuse for killing your son,” Judge Mary Anne Doherty said.

That leaves Rykelan’s foster parents and his biological mother, McKenzie Brown, with questions that have no answers.

“His father, who should have loved him, took his life,” McKenzie Brown said in court, adding later that 25 years was too short a punishment for Emmons.

Rykelan had lived with his foster parents, Sam and Theo Adams, so long they couldn’t imagine life without him.

“We expected and wanted him to become a permanent member of our family,” Sam Adams said. “He made me a mother, and I loved him fiercely.”

She watched Rykelan grow from a baby to an inquisitive preschooler who traded a sippy cup for a prized dinosaur, a collection of diggers for a pile of books.

Then, in 2024, Rykelan was taken from the love and stability of his Cortland County foster home to a strange house in DeWitt filled with seven other children he’d never met and an abusive father who ended up beating him to death.

Why did a father seek custody of his son, only to kill him two months later? And how was he allowed to do that?

A syracuse.com | The Post-Standard investigation found that the foster parents raised concerns over and over that were not taken seriously. Instead, emails, text messages, videos, social service records and court reports show that Cortland County caseworkers seemed driven to close Rykelan’s case. They dismissed reports of physical abuse, eventually green-lighting Emmons’s home, despite the fact that it was a dangerous mess.

Cortland County DSS Commissioner Kristen Monroe has refused to answer questions from syracuse.com. The Adams are in the process of suing Cortland County for failing to protect Rykelan.

Rykelan’s foster mom made sure to reference some of the missteps Tuesday in court.

“I won’t detail the emotional challenges and red flags that appeared between September of 2023, when Emmons’ first filed for custody, and March 2024, when the courts granted that request,” Sam Adams told a judge. “This sentencing isn’t about the custody process. It isn’t about Emmons assuring us that my husband and I could maintain an active role in Rykelan’s life... It isn’t even about the last text message I sent Emmons, where I asked him to wish Rykelan a happy birthday, unaware of what was happening behind closed doors.

“This is about a little boy who was taken from a home where he would be cherished,” Sam Adams said.

Judge Doherty wrestled with the same questions before pronouncing the agreed-upon 25-year sentence.

“I cannot understand what kind of monster seeks custody of his child, only to inflict such serious injuries on a 4-year-old boy to cause his death,” Doherty told Emmons. “You should have left Rykelan with his foster parents... It was, by all accounts, the only place he felt love, or was loved, a place he was clearly cared for.”