Woman Charged With
Scalding Daughter
Updated: Wednesday, 19 Aug 2009, 6:04 PM PDT
Published : Wednesday, 19 Aug 2009, 1:44 PM PDT
Text Story by: CNS
Posted By: David Dain
Murrieta (myFOXla.com) – A mother of two with a history of child abuse pleaded not guilty today to inflicting corporal injury on a child and torture charges for allegedly forcing her 2-year-old daughter into hot water to punish the toddler.
Diana Vicky Estrada, 24, also faces domestic violence causing great bodily injury and serious felony allegations. She was arrested Sunday and booked at Robert Presley Detention Center in Riverside.
She faces life in prison if convicted on all charges.
Riverside County Superior Court Judge Judith Clark — who sentenced Estrada to probation and six months of jail time after she pleaded guilty to child abuse in 2008 — kept her bail at $1 million and ordered her back to court Sept. 11 for a felony settlement conference.
A preliminary hearing was tentatively set for Oct. 2.
According to court documents, Estrada’s original $50,000 bail was raised to $1 million under a penal code statute that calls for an increase in bail if a magistrate determines a domestic violence victim must be protected from a defendant, or if the defendant is a flight risk.
Deputies were called to investigate a possible child abuse case about 2 p.m. Sunday by staffers at an Urgent Care Clinic in Lake Elsinore, after the child was brought in with severe burns on her lower body, according to sheriff’s Sgt. Patrick Chavez.
The girl was later transferred to Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton, which has a burn unit, Chavez said.
When investigators questioned the mother, she initially said her daughter accidentally fell into a hot bathtub in which she was cleaning curtains, according to Chavez.
“Upon further investigation, it was determined Estrada held the 2-year- old in hot water as a disciplinary measure,” Chavez said.
The child was apparently injured last Wednesday, and her burns became infected in the ensuing days, the sergeant said.
Estrada’s other daughter, who is 4, was taken into protective custody, Chavez said.
In 2008, Estrada pleaded guilty to child abuse with great bodily injury and serious felony allegations.
Authorities were called to Rancho Springs Medical Center in 2007, after she showed up with her older daughter, who was treated for a urinary tract infection, multiple bruises and dehydration.
Doctors who examined the child found evidence of healing fractures of both arms, with evidence that the limbs were broken at different times, according to sheriff’s officials.
Records indicate that the child had failed to thrive under the care of her mother, gaining only two pounds between Dec. 12, 2005, and March 10, 2006, according to a declaration in support of an arrest warrant prepared by sheriff’s Investigator Darin Gray.
After the investigation was begun and the child was put in the care of her maternal great-grandmother, she began gaining weight. Previously, when deputies began investigating the case, she had been too weak to stand or walk, Gray wrote.
Estrada was sentenced to 48 months probation and 180 days in jail on the weekend work release program. She also was required to take parenting classes and enroll in a program for child batterers.
A few months after her sentencing, Estrada asked for her work release to be modified to house arrest, then to house arrest in San Diego. In early 2009, the Judge Clark changed her jail term back to work release, though it was unclear why.
Estrada has since allegedly violated parole on the work release program and is scheduled for a probation violation hearing on Sept. 11, court documents show.
So a couple of days later the same friend mentions that the little girl may lose her legs. Her legs may actually not be able to be saved because after the mom burned the crap of out them she then did nothing to care for them for a week or so and by the time she took her to the urgent care it simply may be too late to save the legs. The two year olds legs.
I hate to pass judgement on people, but I seriously wonder what on earth a 2 year old could do that would require this sort of discipline? She’s two, a baby by most terms.
I think the mom must either be mentally unstable or is possessed by some special kind of evilness.
When I read this sort of thing I just wonder how people can be so mean to the innocent of the world. Sigh.
