Mother of the Year Candidate > Baby neglected, daughter drowns alone in pool, Mom drinks at bar

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This year's Mother of the Year so far belongs to Paraguay's Aurelia Salinas, who sold her 3-year-old daughter to be raped and murdered in a trade for crack cocaine. But, I think New York's Erica Baez should come under some consideration.

Bronx girl, 7, drowns in hotel pool while 5-month-old left alone in room

as mom drank at bar: prosecutors

By Larry Celona and Priscilla DeGregory

May 16, 2023 4:13pm  Updated

A Bronx mom allegedly let her 7-year-old daughter drown in a hotel pool — while leaving her 5-month-old baby in the room alone — as she downed drinks at the bar, prosecutors announced Tuesday.

Erica Baez, 41, is now being held without bail on second-degree manslaughter and endangering the welfare of a child charges in the Jan. 13, 2022 horror at a Marriott Hotel in Melville.

The tragic girl, Katlyn, died May 1 after spending more than a year on life support, Suffolk County prosecutors said.

Baez had been staying at the hotel with her boyfriend, her 5-month-old son and Katlyn when the boyfriend left for work early that day, the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office said.

The mom had asked hotel staff to open the indoor pool around 3:30 p.m. — with workers warning her that no lifeguard was on duty and that she’d have to stay with her child, the DA’s office said.

But Baez instead headed to the hotel bar where she ate and drank an alcoholic cocktail while her daughter played alone in the pool for 30 minutes, prosecutors claimed.

The mother went to check on the child but then left her alone again while she went up to the hotel room to see her infant, who was also alone, the DA’s office claimed.

Baez went for a second cocktail and left the daughter for over 30 minutes before returning to the pool to find the girl “floating lifeless in the pool” the office alleged.

Erica Baez was charged with manslaughter after her 7-year-old daughter died after drowning in a Melville Marriott pool (pictured here) while her mother allegedly drank.

But instead of jumping straight in, Baez took time to take off her shoes and socks and put her phone aside before taking Katlyn out of the water, prosecutors said.

When EMS workers arrived, Baez lied telling them she’d only left the girl for five minutes, the DA’s office said.

The EMTs were able to revive the girl but she was left with irreversible brain damage from the lack of oxygen and was forced to live on a ventilator and feeding tube for two months, prosecutors said.

Marriott hotel in Melville, New York.

The little girl died on May 1 after she became septic, the office said.

Baez was arrested on May 15 and charged with second-degree manslaughter and two counts of endangering the welfare of a child. She pleaded not guilty in court on Tuesday.

“The alleged actions of this defendant were selfish, senseless and heartless,” District Attorney Raymond Tierney said in a statement. “We are going to do everything we can to ensure that justice is served for little Katlyn, whose short life ended too soon.”

Baez is due back in court on May 24.

South Sudan Pro-Govt Forces Offered Women to Rape in Lieu of Wages – UN Report

Evil on a spectacular scale in South Sudan

Read with caution

© Andreea Campeanu / Reuters

Pro-government militias fighting in South Sudan’s civil war have been offered women to rape in lieu of wages, according to a UN report. The document also includes harrowing accounts of opposition supporters being killed.

“Credible sources indicate groups allied to the government are being allowed to rape women in lieu of wages but opposition groups and criminal gangs have also been preying on women and girls,” said the UN human rights office, which published the report on Friday.

Over a five-month period last year, more than 1,300 rapes were reported in South Sudan’s Unity State – just one of the country’s 10.

One woman described being stripped naked and raped by five soldiers on the side of a road in front of her children. She said she was then raped by more men in the bushes, only to return to find her children missing.

Another victim said after her husband was killed she was tied to a tree and forced to watch her 15-year-old daughter being raped by 10 soldiers.

Others said they were attacked after leaving UN-protected camps in search of food, while some were abducted as sex slaves or “wives” for soldiers living in government barracks.

“If you looked young or good looking, about ten men would rape the woman; the older women were raped by about seven to nine men,” a witness said.

In one incident, soldiers argued whether or not to rape a 

six-year-old girl, and ended up shooting her, the report claims.

According to the report, the prevalence of rape “suggests its use in the conflict has become an acceptable practice by (government) SPLA soldiers and affiliated armed militias.”

Acknowledging the figures disclosed in the report, UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said those rapes must amount to only a “snapshot of the real total” taking place in the country.

“The scale and types of sexual violence – primarily by Government SPLA forces and affiliated militia – are described in searing, devastating detail, as is the almost casual, yet calculated, attitude of those slaughtering civilians and destroying property and livelihoods,” he said in a statement.

In addition to the disturbing rape figures, the report also “contains harrowing accounts of civilians suspected of supporting the opposition, including children and the disabled, killed by being burned alive, suffocated in containers, shot, hanged from trees, or cut to pieces,” the UN human rights office said.

In a 12-month period ending November 2015, there were an estimated 10,553 deaths in Unity State – 7,165 of which were due to violence. A total of 829 were caused by drowning. The report noted that the killings appeared to be deliberate, systematic, and based on ethnicity.

In one instance, forces from the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) reportedly rounded up 60 cattle-keepers and locked them in a container in the compound of a Catholic Church. All but one suffocated within two days.

Although all sides in South Sudan’s civil war have committed atrocities that may amount to crimes against humanity, government forces were responsible for the most in 2015, according to the report.

The South Sudanese government has denied those accusations, however, maintaining that its soldiers do not target civilians.

“We condemn in the strongest terms possible any crimes committed against civilians,” Ateny Wek Ateny, a spokesman for President Salva Kiir, told the Guardian.

He said the atrocities may have been carried out by militias wearing SPLA uniforms, but stressed that government troops operate under “strict rules of engagement” that prohibit the targeting of civilians.

“The government takes it very seriously and we are investigating to find who has committed these heinous crimes and as soon as we get those who are responsible for committing human rights violations, we will bring them to book,” Ateny said.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International’s senior crisis adviser, Lama Fakih, said on Friday that the UN’s results aligned with her agency’s recent findings in Unity State.

“It’s clear that South Sudan has a problem with its army and allied militias – who have been raping women and girls and leaving men and boys to suffocate to death in a shipping container,” she told the Guardian.

The war in South Sudan began in 2013, when President Kiir accused his former vice president, Riek Machar, of plotting a coup. Fighting quickly broke out between those supporting Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, and those backing Machar, an ethnic Nuer. The conflict has led to the deaths of tens of thousands of people and displaced more than two million. At least 40,000 people have been plunged into famine, and 2.8 million are in need of aid, according to UN's February findings.

74 Children Executed by ISIS for 'Crimes' That Include Refusal to Fast, Report Says

Happy Ramadan everyone! Let's celebrate by crucifying some children!

While Canada and the US were celebrating Canada Day and Independence Day, ISIS was busy executing, in the most gruesome way, dozens of children for minor offences. And for some reason, this has some appeal to potential followers. Evil thrives among us!

By Malia Zimmerman
Fox News

The terrorist group executes men, women and children it finds guilty
of offenses against Islam. (Reuters)

The blood-soaked executioners of ISIS have spared neither women nor children since the jihadist army established its caliphate a year ago, putting an estimated 74 kids and even more women to death for such offenses as practicing “magic” and refusing to fast during Ramadan.

A total of 3,027 people have been executed by ISIS since it declared itself a state under strict Islamic law in Syria and Iraq last June, according to a new report by the UK-based group, Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

"Many of the charges against those executed are recorded as blasphemy and spying, but others include sorcery, sodomy, practicing as a Shia Muslim," the report states.

Just this week, two children whose ages were not known were crucified in the Mayadin, Deir Ezzor province in eastern Syria after ISIS accused them of not properly fasting during Ramadan. The children’s bodies, put on public display on crossbars, each bore a sign explaining their violation during the holy month for Muslims that runs June 17 to July 17. With each execution justified by ISIS' medieval interpretation of the Koran, the group is attempting to portray itself as the true practitioners of Islam, say experts.

“Underlying all these executions is the apocalypse ideology of the final battle between the believers and the unbelievers,” said Jasmine Opperman, the director of Southern Africa Operations at the Terrorism, Research & Analysis Consortium. 

The poor fools don't even know they are on the wrong side of that battle. They are not believers; it requires no faith to follow the law by the letter. It requires faith to follow the 'Spirit' of the law and to allow others to go their own way if they choose to reject that Spirit.

“ISIS is using executions to show its followers -- and would-be followers -- that the group is the only true representative of believers, not only in word, but action, which is why executions are featured so prominently.”

As I stated above, for some reason this resonates with potential followers. I believe there is another 'spirit' at work here and those who embrace it will quickly deteriorate into becoming women and child abusers, torturers and murderers.

Other children died fighting for their lives.

“The violent Islamist group appears to demonstrate a particular interest in children, releasing videos of children fighting in cages and undertaking military training,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights group said. “The report also details moves undertaken by the group to entice children to join, which include setting up offices called "cubs of the caliphate" that recruit children to fight for ISIS.”

The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child released a report in February, documenting the many horrors ISIS has imposed on children who are Kurdish, Yazidi, Christian and even Muslim. Children – even those who are mentally challenged – are being tortured, crucified, buried alive, used as suicide bombers and sold as sex slaves, the report said.

“ISIS is hoping to spur current supporters around the world who are dormant, of which there are millions, into joining their caliphate by advertising acts like these, of which there are millions,” said Ryan Mauro, national security analyst for the Clarion Project, a nonprofit organization that educates the public about the threat of Islamic extremism. “They know that they can greatly increase their numbers by appealing to current radicals rather than the broader masses.” Astonishing!

Women are not spared the cruel brutality of ISIS, either.

The Syrian Observatory found that the terror group carried out more executions this week, murdering two married couples by beheading them publicly with a sword for “sorcery.”

“The Islamic State group executed two women by beheading them in Deir Ezzor province, and this is the first time the Observatory has documented women being killed by the group in this manner,” Rami Abdel Rahman, of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told the Daily Mail.

Other citizens suspected of practicing black magic or sorcery also have been killed, the organization reports, including a magician beheaded in recent weeks in the Iraqi province of Salahuddin.

“The practicing of anything that is not approved by Islamic State under their very strict interpretation of Islam is ‘Haram’ or forbidden,” said Veryan Khan, editorial director for the Florida-based Terrorism, Research & Analysis Consortium. “If the Islamic State thinks that sorcery is real, then black magic would be a threat to them and seen as a danger.”

ISIS stepped up its killing spree this week as it celebrated both Ramadan and its one-year anniversary as a caliphate in Iraq and Syria with three straight days of ruthless public punishments and executions. On June 30, 11 workers from al-Miadin endured live crucifixion and were forced to wear signs saying "70 lashes and to be crucified for 1 day for breaking the fast in Ramadan." 

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the most recent killing spree is less than a week, after ISIS released a video of 15 men executed in three terrible ways: Drowned in cages, having their head blown off with explosives and burning them alive in a car hit with a rocket launcher.

Last Friday, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the death of 38 people in Tunisia who were gunned down, and another 27 people who died after a bomb rocked a Shia mosque in Kuwait.

“Islamic State executions are not merely retribution by the state for behavior seen as illegal,” said Khan, noting executions by the Islamic State include everything from burning alive victims, firing squads, beatings and beheadings, to drowning, explosions, and throwing people off of buildings. “The Islamic State uses executions to intimidate and dominate the local population, for diplomatic communiqués to world leaders, for recruitment purposes and to demonstrate the organization is in complete control.”