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More on Matthew Reid

August 29, 2007 permalink

Continued court hearings have revealed a little more about the death of Matthew Reid.

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Niagara Falls Review Impact statements read in trial for three-year-old victim

Local News - The wailing of a 15-year-old girl pierced the quiet courtroom as the boy she smothered to death was remembered on the stand by his devastated grandmother.

"You destroyed my life and my future," Ramona Jakucinskas cried Friday as the girl in the bubblegum pink shirt bawled in the prisoner's box.

Three-year-old Matthew Reid was living in a Welland foster home when the girl suffocated him with his own pillow.

He was found dead the morning of Dec. 15, 2005.

The girl, whose identify is protected under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, pleaded guilty in January to second-degree murder.

Ontario Court of Justice Judge Ann Watson continued to hear submissions Friday in St. Catharines as she determines whether to sentence the girl as a youth or adult.

The court has heard from several experts that the girl has the cognitive age of six and displays signs of fetal alcohol syndrome. She has had a troubled life and lived in various foster homes.

Jakucinskas, reading her victim impact statement in court, said Matthew was supposed to come live with her in Tillsonburg, where she would raise him.

After his death, she couldn't sleep, eat or go to work and would curl up in a ball, she told the court.

She said cooking reminds her of foods Matthew would like; opening the pool reminds her of things he'd like to do and work days remind her of how he should be going to school.

She decorated his bedroom with SpongeBob SquarePants pictures and can't see the character in stores without crying. It took her nearly two years to get rid of his bedding.

"I would have watched him grow up to be a fine young man," she said. The court has heard the girl arrived at the foster home Dec. 14, 2005 and killed Matthew sometime after 9 p.m. that day. She smeared her own blood on his face, making a cross on his forehead, and tucked a note under his head that said, "I know what his last words were before he died. Momma."

Tania Reid, Matthew's biological mother and Jakucinskas' daughter, submitted a victim impact statement for the judge, but did not wish to have it read in court.

Afterwards she said it would have been too hard to hear.

The judge will continue to hear submissions in the case on Oct. 11.

Source: Niagara Falls Review

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