Chicago Grandmother Accused of Killing Girl

 Posted on July 16, 2013 in Violent Crime

A Chicago grandmother, Helen M. Ford, 51, is being held on no bail and is facing a murder charge in the death of her granddaughter, according to the New York Daily News. According to the Daily News, Ford had been inflicting “abuse for so long that the dead little girl had maggots living in a head wound that had gone untreated.” The girl, Gizzell Kiara Ford, was eight years old. She was dead, and her body had already gone cold, when cops responded to a call of a person not breathing, according to the Daily News. “The girl lived with her grandmother and bedridden father, both of whom were home when the girl died,” reports the Daily News. “Ford initially told cops the girl inflicted the injuries herself, but police found several bruises, burns, and cuts on her body, lying face up in a bedroom in the home.”

In a shocking case, police revealed that “some of the blunt force trauma happened so long ago that maggots had hatched in a head wound and moved to the front of the girl’s scalp while she was still living… the horrific list of abuse also included deep cuts on her buttocks, ligature marks on her ankles and wrists and possible cigarette burns on her body,” reports the Daily News. The official cause of death, according to the Chicago Tribune, was strangulation and several blunt trauma injuries from child abuse and neglect. According to the Tribune, “Helen Ford told police her granddaughter was upset that her mother was not visiting her and would run into furniture in the apartment and bang her head on things,” which investigators quickly ruled out.

According to childhelp–usa.com, “every year 3.3 million reports of child abuse are made in the United States, involving nearly 6 million children.” That’s the worst record in any industrialized nation in the world, with five child deaths every day due to abuse-related causes.

If you or someone you know has been accused of child abuse, don’t go through it alone. Contact a dedicated Chicago criminal defense attorney today.

Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici / FreeDigitalPhotos.net