By the time of Gavriels birth, Ms. Fisher had poured burning oil onto a former partners head, tried to kill herself, been given a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia, and stabbed and used a Taser on an aunt, according to records and interviews...
At a news conference, Mayor Bill de Blasio said his administration was profoundly focused on doing a better job of addressing the kinds of mental health issues that can lead to violence.
In a statement, the commissioner of the agency, Gladys Carrión, said it had begun an investigation into the boys death...
A relative who has been deeply involved in caring for Ms. Fishers first son, however, said that the child welfare agency had been told repeatedly about mistreatment of the older child but that the complaints were not addressed. The agency had contact with Ms. Fisher in 2007 and 2009, during custody disputes over the older child.
Im angry that nobody did anything, the relative said.
Her illness is a tragedy. But her viciousness makes everyone else a victim.
The older son, who has autism, came back from one supervised visit with Ms. Fisher in 2011 with a cigarette burn on his chest, the relative said.
Alone now in her apartment, Ms. Fisher took to hard living. She drank daily, used marijuana and cocaine and sometimes sold drugs, people in her building said. At times, she menaced her neighbors.
Every day she was different, Erwin Castillo, 26, said. Happy one day, another day mad.
In September 2011, during a fight with her aunt, Ms. Fisher attacked the woman with a Taser. Then, wielding a steak knife, she stabbed her aunt in her neck, ear and arm, according to a police report.
Sent to jail at Rikers for three months, Ms. Fisher was classified as seriously mentally ill, with paranoid schizophrenia, according to medical records. She told clinicians that a few days before her arrest, she heard voices telling her that her aunt was trying to kill her.
