When an Ohio mother went on a 10-day vacation, she left her baby girl behind to fend for herself. Needless to say, things didn’t end well for the infant, and the mom who committed “the ultimate betrayal” has since learned her fate.
When 32-year-old Kristel Candelario decided to go on a 10-day summer vacation with her boyfriend, she left her 16-month-old daughter Jailyn behind. Unfortunately, rather than getting a sitter for her baby, the Ohio mom committed the ultimate betrayal, abandoning the infant. Sadly, after being left alone to fend for herself in a dirty playpen, Jailyn met a horrific fate.
According to Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Anna Faraglia, Candelario left Jailyn alone for two days immediately before going on vacation. Then, she left the infant unattended at her home near Lorain Avenue and West 97th Street in Cleveland again when she “went gallivanting around Detroit and Puerto Rico” on her 10-day vacation, The Blaze reported.
Meanwhile, as the mother was seemingly having the time of her life, Jailyn was dying a slow, painful death, losing nearly half her body weight before succumbing to starvation and dehydration. When Candelario eventually made her way back home 10 days after abandoning her daughter, she found her baby dead and emaciated, at which time she decided to call the police — but not before trying to cover up her crime.
First responders arrived at the scene to find Jailyn “in a Pack-N-Play pen on a liner soiled with urine and feces with soiled blankets.” Subsequently, Kristel Candelario was arrested and held on a $1 million bond, initially pleading not guilty to charges of aggravated murder, murder, felonious assault, and endangering children. However, she later pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated murder and one count of endangering children.
During Candelario’s trial, her attorney attempted to paint the callous mother as an emotionally overburdened single mom of two who was “not thinking clearly.” However, the facts presented in court paint a much different picture than the one presented by Derek Smith, Candelario’s attorney. Although Smith tried to strum up sympathy for Candelario, the court was confronted with disturbing numbers that proved just how cruel the mom had been.
As they say, numbers don’t lie, and the court heard alarming ones during the deputy Cuyahoga County medical examiner’s testimony. According to Dr. Elizabeth Mooney, Jailyn weighed 20 pounds at her last doctor’s visit. However, when her body was recovered, it weighed just 13 pounds, leading Mooney to testify that Jailyn’s death was “one of the most tragic and unfortunate cases” she had seen in her career. The doctor believed the baby likely suffered for an entire week before finally passing away.
Making matters worse, Candelario attempted to hide what she had done by changing Jailyn’s clothes before first responders arrived, investigators said. However, with feces in the baby’s eyes and under her fingernails, it was apparent what hell the child’s cruel mother had put her through, and Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Anna Faraglia didn’t mince words when she called out the heartless mother in court.
“The thought of this child dying every day while [her mother is] having fun — humanity can’t stomach that,” said Faraglia. “And those are the actions that need to be punished. She abandoned her daughter and left her for dead.”
Faraglia also asked the court to consider jail phone calls in which Candelario allegedly indicated she had a “blast” while on vacation in Puerto Rico and made plans for what she might do when freed from prison. Stressing that the ruthless mother was unrepentant, Faraglia quoted Candelario as saying, “It’s not like I did it intentionally. It’s not like I picked up a gun or a bat or the girl bled.”
Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael O’Malley also called out the merciless mother in court, saying the infant was “a beautiful baby girl who was taken from this world due to her mother’s unimaginable selfishness.” He added that Candelario’s behavior was a “new low.”
“The thought of going on vacation for 10 days and leaving your child to starve to death in her Pack-N-Play is a new low in parental care,” O’Malley declared.
At her sentencing, Kristel Candelario said God and Jailyn had forgiven her for what she had done. However, County Common Pleas Court Judge Brendan Sheehan wasn’t so merciful. Instead of forgiving the mother, Judge Sheehan slapped her with a life sentence with no chance of parole.
“Just as you didn’t let Jailyn out of her confinement, so too you should spend the rest of your life in a cell without freedom,” Judge Sheehan said. “The only difference will be, the prison will at least feed you and give you liquid that you denied her.”
Wanting to make clear the gross betrayal Kristel Candelario had committed as a parent, the judge reminded the child-killing mother that the bond with her baby should have been a sacred one. Instead, this monster of a mother betrayed that trust, leaving her child to suffer an unimaginable death.
“The bond between a mother and child is one of the purest and most sacred bonds between human beings,” Sheehan added as Candelario was sentenced. “It’s a relationship based on love, trust, and unwavering protection. Yet, in a shocking betrayal of fundamental trust, you committed the ultimate act of betrayal, leaving your baby terrified, alone, unprotected to suffer what I heard was the most gruesome death imaginable.”
What kind of person plans a vacation without arranging care for their child? What mother places their child in a playpen and then walks away for days, knowing the child can’t fend for themselves? What kind of selfishness does one have to possess to have “fun,” knowing their baby is all alone? That’s not a mother. That’s a monster. Kristel Candelario and her attorney would have us believe she just needed a “break.” Well, congratulations! She got a one-way ticket to the “resort” she deserves, where she doesn’t have to worry about parental responsibilities for the rest of her life.
