Another candidate for mother of the year

There are times when I feel like a horrible failure as a mother, then I see stories like this and determine that my kids don't have it so badly.

Mom thought chili powder safe for baby
'She passed away, but not because I intentionally tried to kill her'
Friday, November 11, 2005
By ROBERT THARP / The Dallas Morning News
The pasty mixture of chili powder and water tasted "gross," but a young Irving mother facing capital murder charges testified Thursday that she didn't think it was dangerous to mold it around her infant daughter's thumb and force her to swallow it to break her thumb-sucking habit.
Speaking in her own defense on the third day of testimony in her capital murder trial, Angela Disabella said she placed the pepper mixture on her daughter's thumb several times over about an hour before the baby began to choke in May 2004. "It wasn't hot at all; I tasted it. It just has a weird, gross taste," she said. "It wasn't horribly gross so you would throw it up – just so you wouldn't keep it [your thumb] in your mouth."
Nearly 6 months old, Kira was not yet ready to eat soft food, but Ms. Disabella, 21, said she was not concerned as the globs of brownish red pepper disappeared in the baby's mouth.
"I thought it was working," she said. "As soon as she'd put her thumb in her mouth she'd take it out. ... She'd make this weird smile."
The powder eventually clogged Kira's throat and lungs entirely, causing her suffocation death, according to court testimony. Under cross-examination by prosecutor Patricia Hogue, Ms. Disabella denied that she caused the baby's death.
"She passed away, but not because I intentionally tried to kill her," she said.
Ms. Disabella acknowledged having a troubled adolescence and young-adult life. She didn't complete the ninth grade and ran away at age 16. She also said she had been a danger to herself at times, mutilating her arms with knives and trying to kill herself on several occasions.
Throughout several hours on the witness stand, Ms. Disabella maintained her composure under long questioning by Ms. Hogue about the events that led up to Kira's death.
Although the baby had gained less than a pound in the nearly six months that she lived, Ms. Disabella said she fed her according to what she read in books and magazines. She said she didn't always have formula because her live-in boyfriend and the baby's father, Cameron Stockton, wanted her to breastfeed and refused to buy formula.
"I went by what the book said. I tried to do my best," she said.
Prosecutors have charged that the baby's suffocation was the culmination of a string of neglect and abuse the baby suffered in her short life.
Besides being malnourished, the baby suffered two fractured ribs about a month before she died.
A medical investigator testified that the rib injuries were likely caused by blunt-force abuse.
Friends and relatives of Ms. Disabella testified that she was concerned about the baby's lack of weight gain and that they thought she was feeding her.
They also testified that they believed Mr. Stockton was abusive to Ms. Disabella, a matter that prosecutors say is irrelevant because he was not at home when the baby died.
"Angela was a very caring mother. She cared about her baby. She loved her baby," friend Lindsay Kellner said. "Cameron controlled the relationship. He decided what she would do, where she would go and how they would do things."
If convicted of capital murder, Ms. Disabella will face an automatic life sentence in prison. Jurors will likely also have the option of considering lesser charges of causing serious bodily injury to a child by recklessness or negligence.

Another piece of interesting info from a former classmate of mine, this girl went to Kennedale High School briefly. Ahh, another reason to be proud of my alma mater.