Day Care Fire Case Underway


In February this year, 24-year-old Jessica Tata left seven children unsupervised in her home daycare while she went to the store. Her home caught fire while she was gone, killing four of the children and injuring the other three. Tata is charged with four counts of felony murder, but is currently only being tried for one of those counts. If convicted, she faces up to life in prison.

The prosecution alleges that Tata left the stove on with hot oil, which caused the fire that killed the children. Defense attorneys, however, argue that the fire was due to a faulty refrigerator and not Tata’s negligence. But whether or not Tata is convicted of the full charges, she is likely to be found guilty of several lesser charges.

“They are trying to blame the stove, the refrigerator,” said prosecuting attorney Steve Baldassano, pointing to the parents with dead or injured children who were in the courtroom. “She’s the only person to blame. It’s 100 percent her fault.”

Defense attorney Mike DeGuerin acknowledges that Tata was not without fault. “She should never have left,” they agree. “It was a terrible accident… What it’s not is murder.”

He questions the cause of the fire, saying it’s not clear that the stove was the cause. But a Target manager at the store Tata was shopping at says he remembered Tata saying the burner was on—yet being in no hurry to return.

Video footage of her shopping experience confirms that Tata wasn’t in a rush. She originally told investigators she was at home when the blaze started. If jurors are convinced that Tata did, in fact, leave the burner on, it will go a long way for the prosecutors’ charge of felony murder. She need not have intended the deaths to be convicted of murder; the jurors need only be convinced they happened as a direct result of her actions.

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