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Officials: Baby was starved to death

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By JOSH POLTILOVE

jpoltilove@tampatrib.com

Published: November 4, 2009

TAMPA - One photograph shows a beautiful baby girl with a fat, happy face.

Another shows a dead 5-month-old with sunken eyes. She weighed 6 pounds. Her autopsy showed no body fat.

Without being told it's the same child, you'd never be able to tell.

When Polk County deputies responded to a call Sunday about a baby not breathing at the Lakeland home of Tivasha Logan and Chauncey Gardner, they found more beer than baby food, Sheriff Grady Judd said. There only were about 2 ounces of formula inside the one can they saw.

The child, Chauntasia Gardner, was pronounced dead a few minutes after deputies arrived.

She had been starved to death by her parents, deputies say. Her weight amounted to 1 percentile status among children her age.

Logan and Gardner were arrested Monday afternoon. They are being held without bail on charges of first-degree murder and aggravated child abuse.

The couple were shocked that they had been charged with a crime, Judd said.

"They couldn't see what they would do wrong," he said. "We couldn't see what they did right."

Logan and Gardner told investigators they didn't realize the baby's infant formula was supposed to be mixed with an equal amount of water. The formula, though, came with explicit instructions, Judd said.

The parents told investigators they were mixing the formula with three times as much water, meaning the child was getting only a third of the recommended amount of formula at each feeding.

Since the baby had left the hospital, Logan told investigators, she had tried several times to get an appointment with a doctor but failed because doctors would not accept her form of Medicaid. But Logan was getting government benefits and received a $674 check Oct. 1 for Chauntasia's needs, an arrest report states.

At first, Logan told deputies she noticed Chauntasia had been sick since Wednesday or Thursday and didn't think anything of it because the girl was always skinny, the report states.

After the child's grandmother told deputies that Logan had known for weeks about the girl being sick, Logan told investigators she actually noticed Chauntasia losing weight two weeks before her death, according to the report.

Logan said she was scared that if she took Chauntasia to a hospital, the hospital would call the Department of Children & Families, the report says.

The couple has three other children together - a 4-year-old boy and two girls, ages 2 and 3. Logan has two other children who live at the home, ages 6 and 10.

Those five children appear healthy and are now staying with a relative, and DCF will do its best to make sure they get the help they need and be able to stay together as a family, DCF spokeswoman Carrie Hoeppner said.

Judd said Gardner claimed to have fathered a total of 10 children among different women.

DCF investigated Logan in four prior cases and Gardner in two of those, none of which involved starving children, Hoeppner said. The cases involved neglect, particularly in the supervision of children. The four investigations between 2000 and 2007 revealed some or no indications of abuse, and the children were allowed to stay with the couple.

Chauntasia was born premature May 11 at Lakeland Regional Medical Center. She weighed 2 pounds, 11 ounces, but when she was released from the hospital July 29, she weighed 7 pounds, 8 ounces.

When investigators saw her Sunday, Chauntasia weighed nearly 2 pounds less.

An autopsy was conducted Monday morning. With most people, there is evidence of fat in the body, Judd said. The baby had none.

"This child was tortured," he said. "This child simply wasn't fed."

A typical 6-month-old girl in North America on average weighs 15 pounds, said Richard Frates Jr., a pediatrician at the Watson Clinic in Lakeland.

Gardner, 27, previously has been convicted of several crimes, including cocaine possession.

When Logan, 25, was charged Monday, she already was on weekend work release from jail. She had been arrested for driving with a suspended license, according to the jail Web site.

Reporter Jose Patino Girona contributed to this report. Reporter Josh Poltilove can be reached at (813) 259-7691.

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