SAN ANTONIO – From cars to homes to the streets of San Antonio, it seems no place has been safe for local children lately.
Since July, at least nine children in the city and beyond have either died under what may have been preventable circumstances or found in harm’s way.
Within a two-and-a-half-week period beginning in late July, neighbors in two different parts of Bexar County found toddlers wandering the streets alone.
Fortunately, both children were brought to safety.
“He was tiny. He depended on any adult that he had around him,” a neighbor, who identified herself only as “Gabriella,” told KSAT 12 News at the time.
She noticed the 2-year-old boy, clad only in a diaper, walking down a street in her west Bexar County neighborhood on July 29. Gabriella then brought him home where Bexar County Sheriff’s deputies took custody of him.
They later arrested the child’s mother, Destiny Celaya, 24, as well as the parents of a 2-year-old girl, found wandering in a separate case.
At the time, sheriff’s investigators said that Alexandrea Prewett, 33, and Benito Lopez, IV, 36, could face additional charges.
For other children, though, help arrived too late.
San Antonio police said Daniel Casares, 8, died from gunshot wounds he suffered July 29 when another child in his home on Bob Billa Street was handling a gun.
That other child, a 13-year-old boy, was charged with manslaughter.
At least three other children have died in recent months after being left in hot cars.
So far, no charges have been filed in two of those cases, one in San Antonio and another in Poteet.
However, sheriff’s investigators did arrest the parents of the third child, identified as 15-month-old Ari’Yanna Combs.
Aaron and Shavetta Combs, both 27, are facing charges of injury to a child causing death.
The mother of two other children found dead in west Bexar County last Saturday also told sheriff’s investigators that they died due to a hot car.
Sheriff Javier Salazar told news crews, though, that there were inconsistencies in the story surrounding the deaths of Sevani Stevenson, 6, and Miyani Islar, 3.
Deputies arrested their mother, Tiona Islar, 28.
“It hurts us because what else could we have done?” Department of Family and Protective Services child safety specialist Esmeralda Murua said. ”Is there an extra step that we could have taken?”
Agencies such as Child Protective Services and Child Protective Investigations are part of DFPS.
Murua said the unusually high number of deaths is taking a toll on case workers.
“We are people,” she said. “It does have an impact on us.”
Murua also said accidental deaths are bit easier to explain but, in many cases, also preventable.
“In the cases where children are left in vehicles, a lot of times these families are dealing with a lot of stressors. They’re overwhelmed,” Murua said.
DFPS offers the following tips to avoid leaving a child in a car:
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Always check the back seat before getting out of the car
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Create reminders, such as putting your purse or phone in the back seat, but safely away from your child
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Keep your car locked and your keys out of reach to prevent children from entering the vehicle on their own
For more tips, click here.
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