Foster mom-nurse might face homicide charge

CLIF LeBLANC

Authorities said Thursday they may charge a pediatric nurse-turned-foster-mother with child homicide after she confessed to taping a pacifier to an infant’s mouth.

Angela Deniece Dukes, 30, also lost her foster care license Thursday after a clean history of caring for three other children before the Feb. 8 death of 9-month-old Curtis Williams, officials with the Department of Social Services said.

State Law Enforcement Division director Reggie Lloyd said agents will consult with prosecutors about upgrading the charge to homicide by child abuse.

Dukes had been a foster mother for 11 months until the agency revoked her license on the heels of a SLED charge Wednesday of misconduct toward a child.

SLED filed the lesser charge because agents wanted to arrest Dukes as quickly as possible before she went to work Thursday at Palmetto Health Richland, where she works with ailing children, Lloyd said. She was arrested at her home.

Dukes has worked in the intermediate care section of the neonatal intensive care unit since August 2006, hospital spokeswoman Judy Smith said. She last worked May 1 and was to return for a shift that began at 11:30 p.m. Thursday, Tammie Epps, another spokeswoman, said.

The hospital had received no complaints about Dukes in 2½ years of employment, Smith said. She was suspended without pay as soon as SLED notified the hospital it would file a charge, the spokeswomen said.

Dukes confessed Monday to an agent that she had taped the baby’s mouth shut to hold the pacifier in place, Lloyd said. She used medical tape.

She also had told investigators she gave Curtis the medication Benadryl for his congestion.

Dukes’ job in the intensive care unit entails dealing with babies who have improved enough to transfer from critical care. She worked under the supervision of nursing supervisors and physicians, Smith said.

The hospital is reviewing its neonatal cases as it normally does when it learns of unusual occurrences, she said, adding she does not know how many cases are to be examined or how long the review will take.

Palmetto Health policy does not bar any employee from becoming a foster parent, she said.

Pediatric nurses are highly skilled and generally work in that field because of their love of children, said Judy Thompson, director of the S.C. Nurses Association.

“You are dealing with the most fragile of the fragile,” Thompson said. “This is a very, very needy population.”

For that reason, Curtis’ death has affected even a veteran death investigator.

“I am very dismayed by this,” said Clay Nichols, Richland County’s medical examiner who did the autopsy and has been a pathologist for 24 years.

A nurse skilled enough to work in a hospital with vulnerable children should be especially knowledgeable of the dangers of taping anything over an infant’s mouth, Nichols said.

He likened taping the pacifier to “putting a plastic bag over a child’s head.”

“I want to quit being surprised and hurt,” Nichols said. “But this hurts me to my soul.”

Dukes remains in the Richland County jail under $250,000 bail.

‘EVERYTHING WAS FINE’

DSS had received no complaints about Dukes as a foster parent before the death of Curtis, said Sue O’Toole, who oversees foster care licensing.

“We didn’t have any problems with her,” O’Toole said.

Dukes has 30 days to appeal the revocation of her foster care license, but cannot keep children during that time, O’Toole said.

DSS licensing regulators visited Dukes’ St. Andrews Road apartment several times while she was caring for foster children. “Everything was fine,” O’Toole said.

The agency learned of the taped pacifier from reporters, DSS attorney Virginia Williamson said.

Dukes, who is from Conway and received her nursing degree from Horry-Georgetown Technical College, had expressed interest early on in adopting, O’Toole said.

But she did not file a formal request.

Shirley Jivers, 50, of Cayce, is Curtis’ grandmother. She said she learned of the asphyxiation from a reporter Wednesday.

“I was speechless,” Jivers said. “I stayed up late and just sat on the porch. He was just a cheerful, happy baby, showed a lot of love. He was just one of a kind.”

Curtis recently had learned how to say “grandma” and “mama,” she said.

Jivers is concerned about the safety of her 2-year-old granddaughter, whom DSS placed in another foster home. Jivers said she has not seen the child since.

Authorities took both children when they tested positive for drugs. They took Curtis after Cayce police found him with his biological mother, Katrina Jivers, in a marijuana smoke-filled Cayce motel room. That occurred Feb. 7, the day before he died.

His sister, who wasn’t in the motel room, later tested positive for cocaine and DSS placed her in foster care.

“The first one, he didn’t last in their custody,” Shirley Jivers said. “I’m worried about her. I don’t want the same thing to happen to her.”

Staff writer Lee Higgins contributed to this article