An Ohio mother appeared in court this week to face that she has medically abused her two-year-old son in a near constant basis since he was born.
Jennifer Parker, 43, has been charged with three counts of child endangerment, WLWT reported.
“Meaning that she engaged in a pattern of the overutilization of inappropriate medical care and the under utilization of appropriate medical care,” assistant Butler County prosecutor Lindsay Sheehan said in court.
“Since birth, under Miss Parker’s care, this child, now 2, has been hospitalized over 20 times,” Sheehan said. The hospitalizations occurred in Florida, where Parker previously lived, and in Ohio, where she now lives.
Doctors at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital and the Cleveland Clinic raised concerns of medical abuse this spring, the prosecutor said, and since the boy was removed from Parker’s care in May, he is thriving “and has had zero hospitalizations.”
Sheehan told the court that Parker allegedly interfered with the child’s ability to eat, including cutting and clamping feeding lines and providing insulin or glucose to him even though he does not have insulin or glucose intolerance.
Regarding the feeding tube, Sheehan said that medical staff provided “multiple instances where the mother was not providing appropriate medical care, despite her child showing all instances and ability, for instance, not to have a feeding tube, and she was refusing to move him off that feeding tube and provide oral feeds,” Law&Crime reported.
This past spring, Sheehan said Cincinnati Children’s Hospital and the Cleveland Clinic raised concerns and agreed this is a case of medical abuse.
Parker pleaded not guilty and asked for a low bond, WLWT said.
“My only living relatives are here. My fiancée, all of my friends, actually my ex-husband’s parents are also here in support today so I’m really not a flight risk. Everybody in my whole life is here,” Parker said.
Judge Michael Oster set her bond at $50,000.
The boy’s father, Michael Carpenter, said after court that the child had medical issues since birth and that all decisions about hospitalizations had been made at the direction of doctors. Parker, he said, is “a caring mother who wanted the best for her children.”
According to Law&Crime, Parker was ordered to have no contact with her children, who are in the custody of Butler County Children Services. She is due in court again on November 24.
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[Featured image: Jennifer Parker/Butler County Sheriff’s Office]
