TN - Jonathan Goodrum & Kristina Sawyer for rape of newborn, McKenzie, 2006

[Mama-cita]

I am a nurse and have spent my career working in maternity and pediatrics. It is kind of sad for me to see the many negative responses and suspicious fingers pointed at the hospital workers on this board. It is not easy to become a nurse, and it is very difficult, and very often thankless work with few perks. Most people I have worked with have been kind and compassionate individuals who treat patients with the same compassion which they themselves would like to be treated.
First of all, in response to the overwhelming question by MANY here (and I did work in a newborn nursery in my career as an RN) RECTAL temperatures are NOT routinely used in newborns, axillary temps are (under arm). But I HAVE NO DOUBT that there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY a rectal thermometer could inflict any kind of injury or tearing on the anus at all. If anyone ever saw their newborn pass a meconium after birth, they would have witnessed the anus is somewhat pliable for that reason. It is not easy to get employed in a maternity ward, in addition to background checks, you have to have special tags (usually a different color than people who work in the rest of the hospital) and that is the only way you are allowed to be there on that ward. Hospitals are very persnickety about rules as they pertain to Mom/Baby wards. I don't see how a nurse would have the time to commit such an action. In my day, there were other babies to bathe, change, feed if mom was resting, weigh, take vitals, get PKUs, send for circumcision, oops and here comes the newborn photographer wanting all those babies ready to take the 1st photo. I don't see how it was a nurse. And the only other personnel authorized to be touching those babies would be a licensed aide, helping the nurse. People can't believe parents could do such a thing. I remember working in peds. A particular case comes to mind of a 9 month old who had to have a complete vaginoplasty because of repeated abuse from more than one male relative who lived in the home (dad and grandpa). It happens folks, probably more often than most people think. These parents are young, so who knows what their perception of childbirth etc. is? I am sorry, the parents did something here...it may not have been a penis, but she was forcibly penetrated by something, larger than a thick finger, by one of those two...

ETA - Well I guess she confessed, I am not surprised at the outcome.

 

[SewingDeb]

Mamacita,
I think we all hoped it was not the parents. This is just unbelievable!

 

[christine2448]

Mamacita,
I think we all hoped it was not the parents. This is just unbelievable!

Yes, never meant to offend you mamacita, I know first hand there are wonderful health care workers out there and go above and beyond and would never even THINK of something like this.

One of the staff coulda done it just as easy as the parents, and rational parents think it must be one of the staff, how could a parent do this???

 

[BillyGoatGruff]

I am a nurse and have spent my career working in maternity and pediatrics. It is kind of sad for me to see the many negative responses and suspicious fingers pointed at the hospital workers on this board. It is not easy to become a nurse, and it is very difficult, and very often thankless work with few perks. Most people I have worked with have been kind and compassionate individuals who treat patients with the same compassion which they themselves would like to be treated.
First of all, in response to the overwhelming question by MANY here (and I did work in a newborn nursery in my career as an RN) RECTAL temperatures are NOT routinely used in newborns, axillary temps are (under arm). But I HAVE NO DOUBT that there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY a rectal thermometer could inflict any kind of injury or tearing on the anus at all. If anyone ever saw their newborn pass a meconium after birth, they would have witnessed the anus is somewhat pliable for that reason. It is not easy to get employed in a maternity ward, in addition to background checks, you have to have special tags (usually a different color than people who work in the rest of the hospital) and that is the only way you are allowed to be there on that ward. Hospitals are very persnickety about rules as they pertain to Mom/Baby wards. I don't see how a nurse would have the time to commit such an action. In my day, there were other babies to bathe, change, feed if mom was resting, weigh, take vitals, get PKUs, send for circumcision, oops and here comes the newborn photographer wanting all those babies ready to take the 1st photo. I don't see how it was a nurse. And the only other personnel authorized to be touching those babies would be a licensed aide, helping the nurse. People can't believe parents could do such a thing. I remember working in peds. A particular case comes to mind of a 9 month old who had to have a complete vaginoplasty because of repeated abuse from more than one male relative who lived in the home (dad and grandpa). It happens folks, probably more often than most people think. These parents are young, so who knows what their perception of childbirth etc. is? I am sorry, the parents did something here...it may not have been a penis, but she was forcibly penetrated by something, larger than a thick finger, by one of those two...

ETA - Well I guess she confessed, I am not surprised at the outcome.

I appreciate nurses and docotrs and their work, but to be fair (and realisitc) the medical community attracts its own brand of psychos & deviants. And the medical community is famous for covering for them. Recent cases involving "Angels of death" such as the orderly in Kansas City (or was it California?) and creatures such as Dr. Swango & the UK's "Dr. Death" make it difficult for anyone to be given the benefit of the doubt nowadays.

 

[tennessee]

I think I am going to be sick.

I just heard this on the news and was for me and you too. This poor little baby. All she needs is for someone to love, care, hold, feed and change her. How in the h-e-double hockey sticks can someone look at her and see sex? Surely the other little one is receiving a full check to make sure she hasn't suffered abuse from these monsters.

I wish they could be forced to have a sterilization and spend the rest of their days on an uninhabited island. With no phones, tv or other communication from the outside world.

My heart is breaking for this little girl.



JMHO

 

[gatetrekker44]

We have a newborn baby-don't know if Mom delivered vaginally or had a c-section(this is important because the level of pain meds would have been much different). Also, if a c-section occurred, it usually means there were perceived problems for mom and/or baby.
What if a staff member was taking a rectal temp(not uncommon in newborns)with an older style thermometer that broke? The glass would be more than sharp enough to cause the injury extending to the front area.
I would like to know what samples were taken and if any mercury showed up/ Also, knowing the Mom's delivery status would go a long way to whether or not she may have been involved-cause if you've had a c-section(I have had 2) not only does the epidural keep you numb from the waist down for the first 12 hrs or so, you also usually have a morphine pump that keeps you pretty much in la-la land. And after a c-section, folks are constantly coming in to check your status since it is MAJOR surgery!
My personal belief is that this was a hosp employee accident being covered up or the crime was committed by a hosp staffer.

 

[Jeana (DP)]

We have a newborn baby-don't know if Mom delivered vaginally or had a c-section(this is important because the level of pain meds would have been much different). Also, if a c-section occurred, it usually means there were perceived problems for mom and/or baby.
What if a staff member was taking a rectal temp(not uncommon in newborns)with an older style thermometer that broke? The glass would be more than sharp enough to cause the injury extending to the front area.
I would like to know what samples were taken and if any mercury showed up/ Also, knowing the Mom's delivery status would go a long way to whether or not she may have been involved-cause if you've had a c-section(I have had 2) not only does the epidural keep you numb from the waist down for the first 12 hrs or so, you also usually have a morphine pump that keeps you pretty much in la-la land. And after a c-section, folks are constantly coming in to check your status since it is MAJOR surgery!
My personal belief is that this was a hosp employee accident being covered up or the crime was committed by a hosp staffer.

Please see the post above. The mother confessed. This was NOT a hospital employee.

 

[bakerprune64]

As unbelievable as it may be to some of you (and I understand not wanting to believe something so horrendous), it appears as if there's no question that this newborn was abused by the parents -

Mother expected to file plea in baby's rape

By TONYA SMITH-KING
[email protected]
The girlfriend of a Carroll County man is expected to testify against him [Jonathan Wayne Goodrum] in a case in which both initially were charged with the rape of their 1-day-old baby girl.

Goodrum's girlfriend, Kristina Louise Sawyer, 18, plans to enter a guilty plea June 6 in Carroll County Circuit Court to a lesser charge of failure to report child abuse in exchange for her testimony against him, her attorney Steve West said.

"That plea agreement is conditioned upon Miss Sawyer's testifying truthfully," West added.

The arrest warrant states that "an unknown object" was inserted in the child's rear private area, which caused tears in that area that extended to her front private area.

Complete Article

snip..."Hopefully, Miss Sawyer will comply with all the DCS requirements when she gets out in order to get her child back," West said.


:behindbar I cannot believe that they would even let her have this poor baby back.:furious:

 

[desertjade]

Aunt: Baby doing fine after suspected rape

By TONYA SMITH-KING
[email protected]

MCKENZIE - The infant whose parents are accused of raping her is doing "fine," her aunt said Monday. "She's healthy," Donna Ward said of the child in a telephone interview on Monday. Ward said she is keeping the baby girl and her sister's 1-year-old daughter.





Ward said she doesn't condone what happened and she doesn't believe her sister had any part in it.

"I raised her," Ward said of Sawyer. "I know she didn't do what they said she did."

Asked what Sawyer did for a living, Ward said she was a student in an adult education program.

Police have said Sawyer and Goodrum were living at the Value Inn Motel and were engaged to be married.

Ward was not certain why her sister was at the Value Inn Motel because all her belongings were still at their mother's McKenzie apartment, where Sawyer had been staying, she said. Ward said she doesn't believe Sawyer would have married Goodrum.

Their mother, Lorraine Brandl of McKenzie, said she was too hurt by the incident to comment Monday. A sign on her apartment door stated in part: "Do not disturb. My daughter is not a rapist."

Residents who have heard of the case find it disturbing.

"I can't even fathom where the idea would come from to do something like that," said Joe LaPorta, a former New York resident who is living in McKenzie and doing renovation work at the Value Inn Motel, located on Highland Drive in the town's business district.

Value Inn resident Larry Thomas had seen the couple around the facility when they lived there. He said there needs to be a tough penalty if the couple is guilty.

Nanney said Monday the case is very unusual. "I've never had any case like this before," said Nanney, who has worked more than 16 years in law enforcement. "I've had child rape cases before, but nothing dealing with a child this young."

 

[concernedperson]

Really upsetting to read this thread. The only thing I can add is this some kind of perversion. Not one that I have any documentation on but I am sure there is something out there.

The parents are young and the male seems to be an undesirable. The family saying she wouldn't have married him is interesting.Maybe not backtracking but knowing something else.The young mom seems to go with the flow. Underdeveloped backbone.

Really just posting thoughts not sure of what is going on. But a one day old baby needn't be around any of these people until it is sorted out.JMO.

 

[bykerladi]

How can her sister defend her when she confessed? I don't think anyone is accusing the mother of rape, rather of letting the father of the child do something horrible and not protecting her child!!

 

[OriginalJerseyGirl]

But since we don't know what is in the mother's statement, can we even say that she "confessed"? Is it possible that the prosecutor frightened her into accepting a plea and pointing the finger at the boyfriend? Stranger things have happened. I can't help but remember how I believed that Kevin Fox was guilty largely due to his "confession".

 

[christine2448]

But since we don't know what is in the mother's statement, can we even say that she "confessed"? Is it possible that the prosecutor frightened her into accepting a plea and pointing the finger at the boyfriend? Stranger things have happened. I can't help but remember how I believed that Kevin Fox was guilty largely due to his "confession".

That's exactly what I was thinking...I see no confession here.

 

[OriginalJerseyGirl]

That's exactly what I was thinking...I see no confession here.

Couldn't it even be that the prosecution contends that the mom must have noticed the injury, and therefore "should have" realized what it was from, and reported it? I still don't know for sure - did they let the child leave the hospital with the parents?

 

[2sisters]

i honestly don't think there is a cover up here. Yes hospital employees do abuse patients but I haven't seen any evidence implicating the hospital just these 2 sorry excuses for human beings. LE investigated this thoroughly I'm sure. Please stop pitying this woman, she knew her boyfriend molested this defensless baby and did nothing about it until her butt was on the line. Only then did she want to rat him out. Even if she didn't know in the hospital, she knew when they got home by seeing her baby when she changed her. If it was the hospital employees then when she noticed her injuries at home why didn't she call the police? Or said something at the hospital when she changed her baby. I sure as hell would have if I went to change a diaper or give a bath and saw my baby's vagina and rectum torn.

 

[Marie]

i honestly don't think there is a cover up here. Yes hospital employees do abuse patients but I haven't seen any evidence implicating the hospital just these 2 sorry excuses for human beings. LE investigated this thoroughly I'm sure. Please stop pitying this woman, she knew her boyfriend molested this defensless baby and did nothing about it until her butt was on the line. Only then did she want to rat him out.

I agree with this 100% There is no need to be suspicious of LE or the hospital employees without cause.

 

[OriginalJerseyGirl]

I, for one, am not suspicious of LE or the hospital staff. I am, however, a bit suspicious of the mother's statement and whether or not it means that she "confessed" until we know what it says and under what conditions she made it.

 

[Marie]

A bit more of an update here, pretty much just a statement from the mother's attorney.

Kristina Louise Sawyer, 18, was originally charged with rape along with 19-year-old Jonathan Wayne Goodrum, but she will plead guilty next month to a lesser charge of failure to report child abuse, attorney Steve West said.

The reduced charge is a misdemeanor, West said.

"That plea agreement is conditioned upon Miss Sawyer's testifying truthfully," West said. "The agreement is signed. It's in writing. Miss Sawyer has already cooperated to the extent of giving a full statement to (McKenzie Police Lt. Tim) Nanney" and a Department of Children's Services' caseworker.

 

[2sisters]

" Hopefully, Miss Sawyer will comply with all the DCS requirements when she gets out in order to get her child back."

Well, hopefully Miss Sawyer won't comply b/c she obvioulsy isn't the type of mother these kids need.

 

[OriginalJerseyGirl]

"That plea agreement is conditioned upon Miss Sawyer's testifying truthfully," West said. "The agreement is signed. It's in writing. Miss Sawyer has already cooperated to the extent of giving a full statement to (McKenzie Police Lt. Tim) Nanney" and a Department of Children's Services' caseworker.

The problem I have with that is the following wording from a similar article:

"Neither (her attorney) West, (McKenzie Police Lt.) Nanney nor DCS spokesman Rob Johnson would comment on what Sawyer said in her statement or whether she witnessed the abuse authorities believe took place."

Jackson Sun - [url]www.jacksonsun.com - Jackson, TN[/url]

So I have no idea what she saw, what she said, or what was said to her in order for her to make a statement. I do agree that it is very probable that she saw the injury but since I can't know for sure, I just hate to jump the gun on accusing her.