SC - 4-year old Hope Fields dies after parents submerge her in scalding water - Feb 23, 2024

[Clearsky]

South Carolina couple charged with Homicide by Child Abuse

RICHLAND COUNTY, S.C. (WJBF) – On Friday, February 16th, around approximately 10 p.m., Richland County investigators were contacted by Prisma Children’s Hospital concerning an unresponsive 4-…

www.wjbf.com

On Wednesday, February 21st, 34-year-old Wilbur Fields and 32-year-old Fifi Hill-Fields were both arrested and charged with Homicide by Child Abuse and two counts of Neglect. Both suspects are currently housed at the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center.

 

[LadyL]

here's the female suspect pretending to be a good mother on FB:

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and here's the male suspect:

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[imstilla.grandma]

At a news conference, Lott said Wilbur Fields and Fifi Hill-Fields punished their daughter for soiling her pants by submerging her in scalding water Thursday evening. He said she suffered for about 24 hours before being admitted to the hospital.

Deputies said staff at Prisma Health Hospital contacted them last Friday about a child who was admitted with severe burn marks and injuries.

After being admitted, Lott said Hope was put on life support. After two days of intensive care, she passed away Sunday at 11:17 p.m. Lott said the parents were not there for the child’s passing.

Coroner Naida Rutherford ruled the death a homicide.

Parents charged in death of 4-year-old SC child

Two Richland County parents have been arrested and charged in connection to the death of their 4-year-old daughter.

www.live5news.com

 

[imstilla.grandma]

‘The worst thing that can happen to a child’: Parents charged in death of 4-year-old girl

Parents were charged in connection with the death of their 4-year-old daughter.

www.wbtv.com

 

[housewife]

Horrible. Hope they get life sentences.
"Dipped babies" are way too common.

Most care-giver abuse happens to children at feeding time, toileting time, or bedtime. Makes you want to cry.

 

[SMK777]

I just don’t understand why anyone would think submerging a child in boiling water would be any kind of solution to soiling.

You might get angry, yell a bit, and then do the necessary cleaning up, hopefully with a gentle reminder to tell a parent when you need to go.
They obviously rushed her to the hospital so they weren’t attempting to hide anything.

It doesn’t make any sense to me.

 

[iamshadow21]

I just don’t understand why anyone would think submerging a child in boiling water would be any kind of solution to soiling.

You might get angry, yell a bit, and then do the necessary cleaning up, hopefully with a gentle reminder to tell a parent when you need to go.
They obviously rushed her to the hospital so they weren’t attempting to hide anything.

It doesn’t make any sense to me.

It makes sense if you only want to cause them extreme pain, if that's how you transmute the anger you feel at them into feelings of power and satisfaction.

This kind of abuse murder is never about discipline or parenting, it's about torture, plain and simple.

MOO

 

[housewife]

I just don’t understand why anyone would think submerging a child in boiling water would be any kind of solution to soiling.

You might get angry, yell a bit, and then do the necessary cleaning up, hopefully with a gentle reminder to tell a parent when you need to go.
They obviously rushed her to the hospital so they weren’t attempting to hide anything.

It doesn’t make any sense to me.

The parents have no patience. The parents have no impulse control. When emotion gets high, logical thinking goes out the window.
All they felt in the moment was anger, and they were "punishing" the child.

This was not a planned lesson to teach the child anything.

I wish there was a psychological test required to raise children.

 

[SMK777]

It makes sense if you only want to cause than extreme pain, if that's how you transmute the anger you feel at them into feelings of power and satisfaction.

This kind of abuse murder is never about discipline or parenting, it's about torture, plain and simple.

MOO

It’s horrible. I hate to see these kinds of cases.

 

[SMK777]

The parents have no patience. The parents have no impulse control. When emotion gets high, logical thinking goes out the window.
All they felt in the moment was anger, and they were "punishing" the child.

This was not a planned lesson to teach the child anything.

I wish there was a psychological test required to raise children.

Do you think drugs are involved? Because we all get angry without acting out these things.

 

[naomiuk]

I just don’t understand why anyone would think submerging a child in boiling water would be any kind of solution to soiling.

You might get angry, yell a bit, and then do the necessary cleaning up, hopefully with a gentle reminder to tell a parent when you need to go.
They obviously rushed her to the hospital so they weren’t attempting to hide anything.

It doesn’t make any sense to me.

I don’t think they rushed anywhere, it took 24 hours to take her to hospital and they weren’t there when she died.

 

[iamshadow21]

It’s horrible. I hate to see these kinds of cases.

And they're nothing new. There was one when I was a young child, described on the news, never forgotten it.

Kenyatta Odom, one of the Christmas Jane Does, the one from Georgia, when she was identified the other month, they revealed she'd been killed the same way. She would have been virtually the same age as me, had she got a chance to live.

It's always about the rage of the parent. I don't think any of these people have any kind of conscience about doing it, because even at their angriest, nobody with a conscience and any degree of empathy would torture a baby to death. And it's not a 'snap' like a hard blow, either. Those people have to run the water, get it deep enough, put that baby in, hold them there while they scream as their skin literally peels off. There's nothing instant, moment of insanity, about that. It's considered for maximum suffering. I'm not generally in favour of the death penalty as an institution, but deliberate scalding deaths of infants put me there. There's no place in this world for someone who'd do that to a child.

MOO

 

[quibble]

Horrible. Hope they get life sentences.
"Dipped babies" are way too common.

Most care-giver abuse happens to children at feeding time, toileting time, or bedtime. Makes you want to cry.

I wish there was hard labour, they could reflect on their crime without sitting in a cell whining about what a hard time they are having. JMO

 

[housewife]

Do you think drugs are involved? Because we all get angry without acting out these things.

Not necessarily. Many people have anger issues without partaking at all.

It only takes one time to kill a child. And it's incredibly common.

 

[SMK777]

Not necessarily. Many people have anger issues without partaking at all.

It only takes one time to kill a child. And it's incredibly common.

It’s a horrible thing to realize. And the medical people who see these cases up close must be jaded.

 

[Interested_But_Confused]

I'd like to believe they didn't realise the water was so hot, and that they didn't intend to cause so much harm. But I know that's wishful thinking.

I can't imagine the kind of monster you have to be to do this to a child.

 

[housewife]

I wish there was hard labour, they could reflect on their crime without sitting in a cell whining about what a hard time they are having. JMO

I don't think they will reflect on their actions, they will simply be mad that they got caught.

The thing is, these parents became this way most likely because THEIR environment growing up was also abusive/neglectful. They never leaned any better.

 

[housewife]

It’s a horrible thing to realize. And the medical people who see these cases up close must be jaded.

They are incredibly sad and depressed. Burnout is fast.

 

[iamshadow21]

I'd like to believe they didn't realise the water was so hot, and that they didn't intend to cause so much harm. But I know that's wishful thinking.

I can't imagine the kind of monster you have to be to do this to a child.

I'm not even a parent, but I did a child care course, and literally the first thing they teach you is to test the water on your own skin before the child goes anywhere near it.

With your own bath, with your own taps, you get to setting them on autopilot. I know I do with my bath, I use it most days. I set it, I run it, as it's running, I check it with my hand to make sure it's a good temperature for me.

I'm not saying I've never run a bath too hot, but you dip a toe in, and you know about it. Hope wasn't a babe in arms, she was four. She would have probably been climbing in of her own accord was this a normal bath on a normal day. She'd have words to say "Mommy, it hurts! It's too hot!" the moment her foot dipped in. She might have got a burn, but she wouldn't have died of it.

MOO

 

[housewife]

I'd like to believe they didn't realise the water was so hot, and that they didn't intend to cause so much harm. But I know that's wishful thinking.

I can't imagine the kind of monster you have to be to do this to a child.

It's scary to realize these are just regular people who can't process their emotions. It's very common.

Our schools have started incorporating "social and emotional learning" because impulse control is a learned skill. And we are realizing many "parents" are not teaching this at home--possibly because they never received it, either.