2nd tot in week beaten to death

Uncle of 16-month-old charged with abuse, first-degree murder

CAROL MARBIN MILLER, CHARLES RABIN AND OSCAR CORRAL

Like Zachary Bennett, the 5-year-old boy who died this week, Deondre Bondieumaitre was taken from his troubled mother and placed in the custody of a relative who was supposed to be a better guardian.

Like Zachary, police said, 16-month-old Deondre was beaten to death by the man who was taking care of him.

On Friday morning, Deondre's uncle, Gregory Joseph, 23, became the second man this week and the third in a month to be charged with killing a little boy in his care.

Zachary's case drew the attention of Gov. Jeb Bush on Friday because the boy's father gained custody despite an arrest record that included drug sales and assault charges. Two Department of Children & Families workers resigned Friday in connection with the case. Zachary's death is "another example of how a lack of commitment to the highest quality will yield a tragic result," Bush said.

But the governor was quick to defend the agency's efforts at reform and said Zachary's death probably was an "isolated incident."

"What happens when these things occur is it lessens the positive things that are going on inside the department," Bush said.

Police say Joseph, of 6930 NW 186th St., admitted Friday morning to striking Deondre in the head. Joseph was arrested and charged with aggravated child abuse and first-degree murder.

CAUSE OF DEATH

An autopsy by Miami-Dade's medical examiner showed the cause of death as "blunt force trauma" to the head. Joseph is being held at the Miami-Dade County Jail.

Internal DCF reports say Struisanne Joseph, the boy's aunt and "foster mom," was giving Deondre a bath Wednesday when she left him alone in the tub briefly to turn on the dishwasher. When she returned, Deondre had defecated in the tub.

"She picked him up and placed him next to the bed, and returned to the bathroom," the report states. "She went back to the bedroom and found him lying in more feces and straining and clenching his teeth as if he was having a seizure."

At some point, police say, her husband, Gregory Joseph, struck the babyin the head.

When the boy arrived moments later at Palmetto General Hospital's emergency room, he was in "full cardiac arrest," the report states. Doctors tried for 45 minutes to revive him.

SHORT, HARD LIFE

Deondre never had it easy. He was a foster child being raised by a foster child.

He was born on Nov. 24, 2001, while child welfare workers were investigating reports that his then-14-year-old mother, Farah Devil, was living in a runaway shelter after being hit by her own mother with a wire hanger.

Farah was apparently no better at parenting, DCF records show. On Feb. 25, 2002, the DCF's abuse hot line received a report that Farah was taking Deondre outside, against doctor's orders, while he had a severe chest cold.

"He has a virus/bronchitis with difficulty breathing and keeping food down," the report said. "The mother was instructed to keep him inside the home due to how sick he was."

The report said Farah left the house with the boy and had not returned in three days. "She has a history of hanging out on the street."

The following August, Farah was arrested at a Marshall's department store, with Deondre. An abuse report states that Farah and a friend were shoplifting, placing stolen goods in the baby's diaper bag. Last fall, Deondre was sent to live with the Josephs, where his father had been staying, Farah said.

State criminal records do not show any arrests for Joseph.

Farah said Friday night that Gregory Joseph had told her Deondre died from a seizure.

A 10th-grader at Miami Central High School, Farah said she never took her son out against doctor's orders. She said her friends were the ones shoplifting, using Deondre's diaper bag unbeknownst to her, and that she pleaded guilty to the crime to get it behind her.

She said she noticed bruises and scratches on Deondre's face in January and told a DCF worker about it. And the last time she saw her son, April 11, she saw more, she said.

'I asked [the DCF worker], `Did you see the scratches on Deondre's face?' " she said. "He said yes he saw them. I wonder why he didn't react to them."

Samara "Sam" Kramer, the DCF's interim Miami administrator, declined to discuss Deondre's death in detail Friday, saying the agency was still awaiting confirmation from police that the boy's death resulted from abuse or neglect, which would allow officials to discuss the case.

"We are still in the mode of getting official confirmation," Kramer said. "It's a horrible tragedy when a child dies, and we are looking at his care, and the department's involvement."

Wednesday's death came less than 24 hours after Christopher Lamont Bennett, a Key West man with a long criminal background, allegedly beat his 5-year-old son Zachary to death.

Zachary's mother allegedly abused drugs and left her child unsupervised at times.

Despite a background that included cocaine sales, stalking and assault and battery, DCF workers had decided that Bennett was the best choice to take care of a sickly son he barely knew. They did not run a criminal record check on Bennett at first; when they finally did get his records, they didn't share the information with the judge who had placed Zachary with his father.

Zachary died from the combination of a ruptured liver, a bleeding brain and "broken ribs consistent with having been stomped on," his autopsy said. Like Joseph, Bennett, 28, was arrested and charged with aggravated child abuse and first-degree murder.

In March, 8-month-old Kelton Wright was allegedly killed by his father, Victor Robinson, of Miami -- a man whose past includes mental illness and the repeated molestation of a disabled family member. Despite that, the DCF rated the risk of placing Kelton with his father as "low."

MAJOR REMAKE

The agency is undergoing wholesale reforms in the wake of the embarrassing disappearance of

from DCF supervision. It was a year ago today that the agency realized it hadn't seen Rilya in 16 months. If she is alive today, she is 6.

Since then, Jerry Regier has replaced Katherine Kearney as the DCF's leader, and seven of the agency's 14 district administrators have been replaced. The department is working more closely with police to find missing children and is speeding up efforts to turn child-welfare services over to local nonprofits.

Many, however, remain skeptical as to whether the changes have created an environment any safer for children.

Tallahassee lawyer and child advocate Karen Gievers said the DCF continues to place children in the homes of caretakers with shady backgrounds, often just to "get the file off someone's desk."

"As the department makes the decision on who gets the child, they don't tell the judges what is known about the caretaker or background checks," Gievers said.

"The bottom line is I haven't seen any changes yet. The department has substandard social work, substandard investigations, and most frightening, the continued withholding of information from the courts."