![\"\"](\"http:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/BreakingNews2-300x225.jpg\" "\\"BreakingNews2\\"")
The owner of the Smith Family Daycare where a two-year-old boy drowned in June turned herself her in at the Lee County Jail today.<\/p>\nThe owner of the Smith Family Daycare where a two-year-old boy drowned in June turned herself her in at the Lee County Jail today.<\/p>\n
Melissa Smith turned herself her in a warrant for her arrest on charges of manslaughter.<\/p>\n
She owns Smith Family Daycare, where Christian Byrd drowned in a backyard pool on June 24th.<\/p>\n
After a few moments inside the jail, she met with her attorney, Robert Harris.<\/p>\n
“She was willing to turn herself in. She did so within a few hours,” Harris said.<\/p>\n
Deputies say Smith was charged with Aggravated Manslaughter for intentionally leaving Byrd in the pool, knowing he could not swim. She’s also facing three charges of Child Neglect.<\/p>\n
From the LCSO:<\/p>\n
A Lehigh Acres daycare owner is under arrest tonight for her role in the death of a two year old child.\u00a0 Melissa Smith, DOB 6-15-71, of 5003 Lee Circle North, Lehigh Acres, is charged with Aggravated Manslaughter\u00a0and three counts of Child Neglect.\u00a0 Smith is the owner of Smith Family Daycare, which operated\u00a0out of her home.<\/p>\n
On June 24, 2013 at approximately\u00a02:30 p.m., deputies were called\u00a0to 5007 Lee Circle North (located next door to the daycare). Smith had brought an unresponsive child to the residence seeking medical assistance.\u00a0 Deputies assumed rescue efforts until medics arrived.\u00a0 The child, later identified as Christian Byrd, DOB 8-2-10, was rushed to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.<\/p>\n
The Lee County Sheriff’s Office Major Crimes Unit assumed the investigation.\u00a0 The investigation revealed that Smith was watching seven children under the age of five in her house that day.\u00a0 Smith\u00a0placed Byrd, a three year old, and two four year olds in a portable swimming pool in her backyard and left them alone.\u00a0 Smith then went inside the home to attend to the other three children when she realized she needed to use the restroom.\u00a0 As Smith exited the restroom, approximately five to seven minutes later, one of the children told her “Christian’s dead.”\u00a0 That’s when Smith scooped the child into her arms and ran to the neighbor’s home.\u00a0 In doing so, she left the\u00a0three children still unattended in the pool, as well as the other three in the home.<\/p>\n
The autopsy determined that Christian Byrd died as a result of drowning.<\/p>\n
Due to Smith consciously and intentionally leaving the victim in a swimming pool without supervision and knowing he could not swim, detectives\u00a0charged Smith with Aggravated Manslaughter and Child Neglect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The owner of the Smith Family Daycare where a two-year-old boy drowned in June turned herself her in at the Lee County Jail today. Melissa Smith turned herself her in… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":25076,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57,32],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25075"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25075\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}