NYT: New York Missed or Ignored Signs on Girl Who Died

New York Missed or Ignored Signs on Girl Who Died

By RAY RIVERA 

Published: October 5, 2010

A 4-year-old Brooklyn girl who weighed 18 pounds when she died in September appears to have gone months without a visit from child welfare workers assigned to monitor her well-being, despite indications that she could be at risk, New York’s child welfare agency revealed on Tuesday.

“We needed to do more to help,” said John B. Mattingly, the commissioner of children's services. The agency offered a wrenching glimpse into the final months of the girl, Marchella Pierce, whose home care, it said, was “grossly inadequate.” It also found that her mother beat her with a videocassette case for punishment and tied her to a bed “for substantial periods of time.”

In a preliminary report released at a City Council hearing, the agency, the Administration for Children’s Services, provided its most detailed look yet at the events that preceded the death of Marchella, whose bruised and emaciated body was found in her family’s Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment on Sept. 2.

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