Post by Milisha on Dec 11, 2008 13:49:16 GMT -5
She loved to sing Whitney Houston's "I Want to Dance with Somebody," and she would tell jokes and stories to her three brothers, Joseph, Timothy and Jonathan.
The director of the Horizons for Youth camp recalled: "Michelle was not a quick child to laugh, but once she got past the barriers that serious little face would break into an incredible smile. It was almost like the sun breaking through."
But the sun she radiated into the lives of those who knew her would forever set on October 6, 1994.
The Emergency workers struggled feverishly to revive the slender body of Michelle Walton. Clad in black pants and black-and-white turtleneck, she was found in a littered hallway of her Mattapan foster home under 380 pounds of sheetrock.
THE INQUEST
Doctors at Carney Hospital examined her body finding that not only had she been sexually abused girl thingylly and anally, but the abuse had been chronic. The largeness of her girl thingyl opening, as well as the scarring on the outside of her girl thingy, suggested the abuse "was repeated and took place over a period of time," according to Dr. Margaret Gutierrez of the Carney Hospital.
Judge Arthur Sherman, chief judge of Cambridge District Court, determined after an inquest that Michelle had been "chronically abused at some point during her three-year stay" in foster care. He did not say by whom.
During the inquest, her foster parents, along with their children, gave conflicting accounts of how the death occurred. When questioned about whether they had sexually abused Michelle, both the foster father, Charlie Johnson, and his teenaged son Saleen each claimed the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, refusing to answer the question.
Michelle's foster parents claimed Michelle had been crushed by nearly 400 pounds of Sheetrock. Yet she had not a single broken bone and only a few mild bruises, several of them around her neck. There was not so much as a speck of dust on her body.
The autopsy determined that her death was due to asphyxiation, yet it remained unclear exactly how she died. Medical Examiner Leonard Atkins testified at the inquest that covering her mouth and nose, or placing a weight on her chest could have caused her death.
Said judge Sherman in a subsequent interview: "In my judgment she was smothered, smothered with a pillow or a towel or some celluloid plastic thing. The Sheetrock was placed on top of her to make it appear that was how she died."
The jury had been unable to determine who was responsible for her death. Said judge Sherman: "You can't charge anybody because there's nobody to point a finger at. There're no clues. No witnesses. No circumstantial. All we have is a result to look at. A body."
HER MOTHER
Barbara Ruffin learned about her daughter's death on the 10 p.m. television news. The newscaster did not identify the girl by name, but Ruffin recognized the blue house surrounded by metal fencing as it flashed on the TV screen. She had walked by it countless times. "I never went inside, but I been past that house so many times. I mean, my babies were in there," she told reporters.
During much of the previous year Ruffin had stayed clean of the drugs that led to her four children's placement, and she participated in a score of programs in an effort to reclaim her children, who had been placed in foster care in 1991.
In August 1993, Ruffin returned to her old habits, and stopped showing up for her weekly meetings with her children. The Department of Social Services, which had temporary custody of her four children, abandoned hope of reuniting the family in September of 1993, moving to put the children up for adoption.
Michelle's mother carries a knapsack with her daughter's autopsy report along with other assorted documents that chronicle Michelle's death. Says Ruffin: "I carry 'em because it makes it easier for my sanity. It helps me from going insane. Or maybe it just keeps her alive a little bit longer."
THE DEPARTMENT
Incredibly, during the proceedings, with the possibilities of sexual abuse and murder in the case still looming, the Department of Social Services placed Michelle's surviving brothers back into the same foster home. It was only after a report in the Boston Globe that the children were again removed.
Writing in the December 10, 1995, edition of the Boston Globe reporter Sally Jacobs notes that even after her death, the system continued to fail Michelle: "The Department of Social Services, which had custody of Michelle, has turned to the 16 other foster children that have died in its care since."
The director of the Horizons for Youth camp recalled: "Michelle was not a quick child to laugh, but once she got past the barriers that serious little face would break into an incredible smile. It was almost like the sun breaking through."
But the sun she radiated into the lives of those who knew her would forever set on October 6, 1994.
The Emergency workers struggled feverishly to revive the slender body of Michelle Walton. Clad in black pants and black-and-white turtleneck, she was found in a littered hallway of her Mattapan foster home under 380 pounds of sheetrock.
THE INQUEST
Doctors at Carney Hospital examined her body finding that not only had she been sexually abused girl thingylly and anally, but the abuse had been chronic. The largeness of her girl thingyl opening, as well as the scarring on the outside of her girl thingy, suggested the abuse "was repeated and took place over a period of time," according to Dr. Margaret Gutierrez of the Carney Hospital.
Judge Arthur Sherman, chief judge of Cambridge District Court, determined after an inquest that Michelle had been "chronically abused at some point during her three-year stay" in foster care. He did not say by whom.
During the inquest, her foster parents, along with their children, gave conflicting accounts of how the death occurred. When questioned about whether they had sexually abused Michelle, both the foster father, Charlie Johnson, and his teenaged son Saleen each claimed the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, refusing to answer the question.
Michelle's foster parents claimed Michelle had been crushed by nearly 400 pounds of Sheetrock. Yet she had not a single broken bone and only a few mild bruises, several of them around her neck. There was not so much as a speck of dust on her body.
The autopsy determined that her death was due to asphyxiation, yet it remained unclear exactly how she died. Medical Examiner Leonard Atkins testified at the inquest that covering her mouth and nose, or placing a weight on her chest could have caused her death.
Said judge Sherman in a subsequent interview: "In my judgment she was smothered, smothered with a pillow or a towel or some celluloid plastic thing. The Sheetrock was placed on top of her to make it appear that was how she died."
The jury had been unable to determine who was responsible for her death. Said judge Sherman: "You can't charge anybody because there's nobody to point a finger at. There're no clues. No witnesses. No circumstantial. All we have is a result to look at. A body."
HER MOTHER
Barbara Ruffin learned about her daughter's death on the 10 p.m. television news. The newscaster did not identify the girl by name, but Ruffin recognized the blue house surrounded by metal fencing as it flashed on the TV screen. She had walked by it countless times. "I never went inside, but I been past that house so many times. I mean, my babies were in there," she told reporters.
During much of the previous year Ruffin had stayed clean of the drugs that led to her four children's placement, and she participated in a score of programs in an effort to reclaim her children, who had been placed in foster care in 1991.
In August 1993, Ruffin returned to her old habits, and stopped showing up for her weekly meetings with her children. The Department of Social Services, which had temporary custody of her four children, abandoned hope of reuniting the family in September of 1993, moving to put the children up for adoption.
Michelle's mother carries a knapsack with her daughter's autopsy report along with other assorted documents that chronicle Michelle's death. Says Ruffin: "I carry 'em because it makes it easier for my sanity. It helps me from going insane. Or maybe it just keeps her alive a little bit longer."
THE DEPARTMENT
Incredibly, during the proceedings, with the possibilities of sexual abuse and murder in the case still looming, the Department of Social Services placed Michelle's surviving brothers back into the same foster home. It was only after a report in the Boston Globe that the children were again removed.
Writing in the December 10, 1995, edition of the Boston Globe reporter Sally Jacobs notes that even after her death, the system continued to fail Michelle: "The Department of Social Services, which had custody of Michelle, has turned to the 16 other foster children that have died in its care since."