A mother and father have been charged in the smothering death of their toddler.
Loren Gage and Dakota Spencer, both 26, and both of Middlesboro, were indicted by a Bell County Grand Jury on Wednesday in the death of their 17-month-old child on July 30.
Gage was indicted for wanton murder and Spencer with first-degree manslaughter.
(“Wantonly” is defined by Kentucky Revised Statute 501.020(3) in the following way:
A person acts wantonly with respect to a result or to a circumstance described by a statute defining an offense when he is aware of and consciously disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the result will occur or that the circumstance exists. The risk must be of such nature and degree that disregard thereof constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of conduct that a reasonable person would observe in the situation. A person who creates such a risk but is unaware thereof solely by reason of voluntary intoxication also acts wantonly with respect thereto.)
Gage was “extraordinarily intoxicated” when she fell asleep around midnight on a couch with the “baby against the back of the couch,” the Herald-Leader reports, resulting in the toddler being smothered as Gage slept.
Spencer was in the room the entire time.
During the middle of the night, Gage woke up and smoked a cigarette, not noticing that her child was already deceased. She did not discover her toddler was dead until approximately 7:00 a.m.
The indictments, according to the Herald-Leaders, states that “Gage engaged in wanton conduct that caused the death of the baby, while Spencer permitted abuse of the baby and allowed Gage to cause the baby’s death.”
The entire incident was captured on the family’s surveillance system.
Mike Taylor, the Commonwealth’s Attorney prosecuting the case, told the Herald-Leader: “This is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life. The grand jury listened to it, I’ve listened to it multiple times. On the video, which also has audio, you can hear that child’s last breath.”
Both suspects are lodged in the Bell County Detention Center.
(Photo l-r: Loren Gage, Dakota Spencer)
By Ken Howlett, News Director
Contact Ken at ken@k105.com
