Friday, September 14, 2018

Judge delays sentencing in Bristol Township day care death

Posted: Sept. 12, 2018

Christopher and Christine Sawicki enter the courtroom
Calling the court case before him complex, significant and tragic, a Bucks County judge delayed sentencing for a Bristol Township woman who operated an illegal home day care where a 19-month-old girl died last year after she was strapped in a car seat for a nap and left unsupervised for at least an hour, a case that shined a spotlight on the potential risks of underground child care providers.
“This is a difficult decision for any well-meaning judge,” Judge Brian McGuffin told a courtroom packed with supporters of defendant Jaimee Lee Gorman, 36, as well as the parents of Alivia Sawicki, the girl who died while in Gorman’s care on June 16, 2017. “I don’t know what I am going to do. I will try my best to be wise and just and fair.”
McGuffin decided to postpone sentencing 60 days for Gorman, who pleaded guilty Monday to endangering the welfare of children, a first-degree misdemeanor, so he can have time to digest the facts of the case and review documents including victim impact statements. The judge said that he was not made aware of the “significance” of the case until 30 minutes before he took the bench, and he wanted to take his time deliberating.
“It is a sad, sad, tragic event that occurred,” he said, adding he had empathy for both families. “It merits strong consideration.”
Gorman was operating an unlicensed child care business the day Alivia Sawicki suffocated and died in a car seat after she was left alone for an afternoon nap in a second-floor bedroom of the home Gorman rented. A state-mandated review of the death found it appeared the chest buckle on the car seat pressed into Alivia’s neck when the child tried to get out of the seat. A 14-year-old relative of Gorman’s found the girl when she went to wake her.
The Bucks County District Attorney’s Office initially declined to press criminal charges against Gorman.
The office reopened the case after this news organization investigated the death and learned that at least four of the nine children Gorman was watching — including the Sawicki siblings — were not her family, suggesting that she was operating an illegal, unlicensed child care business. State licensing is required for child care providers regularly supervising four or more children who are not their family members.
Alivia Sawicki (L) Jaimee Lee Gorman (R)
Gorman, a single mom of three, was initially charged in March with operating an unlicensed facility, a felony offense when a death occurs. The charge was later reduced to endangering the welfare of children to bar Gorman from providing child care services in the future. She faces a potential maximum of five years in state prison and up to $10,000 in fines and remains free on unsecured bail.
With her attorney beside her, a visibly upset Gorman told the judge that she and Alivia’s mom had a conversation about how the toddler liked to be rocked to sleep in the carrier with her blanket and a pacifier.
“She would just cry in the crib,” Gorman said.
But when the judge asked her, Christine Sawicki — wearing a purple T-shirt with “Alivia’s Fight” across the chest — contended her daughter only napped in car seats when she was traveling in a vehicle.
“We never physically put her in her car seat for a nap,” she added. “We never left her unattended in a car seat.”
Sawicki added that during the roughly six months that Gorman — a high school acquaintance she reconnected with on social media — watched their two children, she and her husband, Christopher, didn’t know Alivia was left in a car seat for naps. She told McGuffin they only suspected what was happening — and told Gorman to stop — after they noticed the car seat would be wet with urine in the afternoons when the kids were picked up, she said. The couple also warned Gorman to watch Alivia when she was in the car seat because she loved to rock in it, she added.
Christine Sawicki shows her tattoo of Alivia
In the hallway before the hearing, Christine Sawicki said she was fine with the judge taking more time to decide a sentence.
“I just want people to know it’s not OK to kill people,” she said.
Christine Sawicki’s mother, Christina Witman, described the loss of Alivia as a black hole of sadness. Roughly nine months after Alivia died, Christine gave birth to a son named Asher. Everyone tells the family he bears a strong resemblance to the big sister he’ll never know, she added.
Life has been especially tough for her older brother, Austin, now 5, Witman said. He talks nonstop about Alivia.
She recalled what Austin said to his baby brother one day when Asher was about a month old and acting fussy.
“He said, ‘Do you miss Alivia, too?’” Witman said, tears filling in her eyes. “That just broke my heart. It broke my heart.”

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