3 May 2011
Faith healing parents convicted of homicide for daughter's death from untreated diabetes lose appeal for new trials
Wausau Daily Herald - Wisconsin April 28, 2011
Judge Vincent Howard denies appeals of Dale and Leilani Neumann in prayer death convictions
The Weston parents convicted of second degree reckless homicide in the death of their daughter, Madeline Kara Neumann have lost their appeal for new trials. Marathon County Judge Vincent Howard ruled this afternoon to deny the post-conviction motions of Dale and Leilani Neumann.
Kara died March 23, 2008, from complications of undiagnosed diabetes while the Neumanns, who believe in faith healing, prayed for the girl's recovery.
Dale Neumann argued he should get a new trial because jurors in his prayer-death trial could have been biased after learning that his wife was previously convicted in the case. Leilani also appealed on grounds she was improperly defended in a separate second-degree homicide trial in 2009.
Judge Howard, who oversaw the separate trials for Dale and Leilani, wrote that “hindsight” was not enough reason to overturn “strategic decisions” made by the couple’s attorneys.
Dale’s defense attorney and prosecutors came to a joint decision to inform the jury of Leilani’s prior conviction, rather than risk members of the jury who were unaware of the conviction finding out at trial, Howard wrote.
“It is admittedly extraordinary to actually inform potential jurors of a prior conviction of a co-defendant, but there is no real denying that these trials were also very extraordinary,” Howard wrote.
Leilani’s argument that her trial attorney should have put stronger emphasis on her sincere belief that prayer is a form of treatment also was rejected by Howard. The judge wrote that attorney Gene Linehan had to make a quick decision during his closing argument, following prosecutors’ attempt to portray Leilani as a “religious extremist.”
“Hindsight can sometimes reveal places where there is room for improvement,” Howard wrote. “Trial counsel certainly could have better explained and emphasized the sincere belief defense...but room for improvement is not the same as deficient performance.”
Steve Miller, Dale Neumann’s attorney, said this afternoon that he hadn’t seen the decision yet and declined comment. A message left with Leilani Neumann’s attorney was not immediately returned.
Both Dale and Leilani Neumann were sentenced in October 2009 to six months in jail, 10 years probation and 120 hours of community service. Howard delayed the jail terms pending appeals.
They are also required to have their remaining juvenile children regularly examined by health officials.
Marathon County Assistant District Attorney LaMont Jacobson, who tried both Neumann cases, said his office was “certainly pleased with the outcome.”
The Neumanns’ attorneys raised some issues that “were troubling,” particularly the jury being informed of Leilani’s prior conviction, Jacobson said.
“We were all in a position where we had to balance (Dale’s) right to a fair trial, to a speedy trial and his right to have the trial occur in Marathon County,” Jacobson said. “And it was all with the backdrop of Leilani’s conviction.”
Jacobson said he suspects both Dale and Leilani Neumann will appeal Howard’s decision to the Court of Appeals, where the prosecution will be represented by the state attorney general’s office.
This article was found at:
http://www.wausaudailyherald.com/article/20110428/WDH0101/110428143/Judge-denies-Neumann-appeals-prayer-death-convictions
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Lawyers ask Wis. court to rule in prayer death
ReplyDeleteBy TODD RICHMOND, Associated Press | December 4, 2012
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A couple who prayed instead of taking their daughter to the hospital as she lay dying at their home were rightfully convicted of homicide, a state attorney told the Wisconsin Supreme Court on Tuesday in a case that raises questions about when prayer healing turns criminal.
Attorneys for Dale and Leilani Neumann argued that the couple didn't know when the state's legal protections for prayer healing ended and criminal liability began.
But Assistant Attorney General Maura Whelan told the justices that Wisconsin's religious protections clearly don't apply when a child dies and the couple caused the death of their 11-year-old daughter, Madeline Kara, who was suffering from undiagnosed diabetes.
"They created an unreasonable and substantial risk of death," Whelan said. "They did so knowingly and they caused Kara's death."
The Neumanns are appealing their conviction in a case that poses charged questions for the justices about when the state's responsibility to protect children trumps religious freedom.
More than a dozen states have some form of legal protection for parents who choose to heal their children through prayer rather than seek conventional medical help, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The states have been grappling for years with how far those protections extend, but never before have Wisconsin's courts been asked to address when an ailing child's situation is so serious that prayer treatment becomes illegal.
"The court is left with very difficult legal questions in a tragic case," Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson told the attorneys as Tuesday's oral arguments ended.
It's unclear when the court might rule. The justices face no deadline and they often take months to issue decisions.
continued in next comment...
Madeline Kara died on Easter Sunday in March 2008 in her parents' Weston home after developing a treatable form of diabetes. Her parents chose to pray for her rather than seek medical help. After she died, they insisted God would raise her from the dead.
ReplyDeleteMarathon County prosecutors charged the couple with second-degree reckless homicide. Separate juries convicted each of them in 2009. They each faced up to 25 years in prison but a judge sentenced them each to serve a month in jail for six years, with one parent serving every March and the other every September, and spend a decade on probation.
Still, their attorneys appealed. They maintain the couple was wrongly convicted, pointing to a state law that protects people who provide spiritual treatment for a child in lieu of medical help from child abuse charges.
They argue the law protects parents through the point of creating a substantial risk of the child's death, making it difficult to know when a situation has grown so grave that parents who stick with prayer healing expose themselves to other criminal charges.
"They believed prayer was the best thing for her," Leilani Neumann's attorney, Byron Lichstein, told the justices. "How do they know when that prayer treatment becomes illegal?"
Whelan argued that anyone who reads the protection statute would realize it applies to child abuse charges, not homicide. Once parents realize a child is in danger of dying, their legal immunity ends, the attorney said.
The Neumanns had to have known their daughter was nearing death after she lapsed into coma and turned blue, triggering a legal duty to protect her by seeking medical help, Whelan said.
"You can treat this child through prayer, but you better make sure this child doesn't die," Justice Annette Ziegler said, summing up Whelan's arguments.
Both Lichstein and Dale Neumann's attorney, Steven Miller, conceded that legal immunity for prayer healing ends when it's clear a child is going to die. But the Neumanns' daughter showed some signs of improvement before she passed away, they said.
Justice Patience Roggensack noted the juries decided the girl was in danger of dying. She questioned why the justices shouldn't rely on the juries' determinations that the couple crossed the line.
But the justices said little else during Tuesday's hearing that shed light on their feelings on the case, instead mostly focusing their questions on making sure they understood both sides' stances.
http://www.chron.com/news/article/Lawyers-to-ask-Wis-court-to-rule-in-prayer-death-4088624.php