Police Probe Death of 4- Year-Old Girl

By JIM NOLAN

Police are investigating the death Sunday of a 4-year-old girl who fell ill while in the care of her mother’s domestic partner at the couple’s home in North Richmond.

Richmond major-crimes detectives were at the home in the 2500 block of Third Avenue yesterday morning with a search warrant.

A Richmond police spokesman said the case is being treated as a death investigation, and a cause and manner of death will be determined after an autopsy by the state medical examiner’s office.

Officials said the partner called the child’s mother Sunday evening at her job at the Beth Sholom nursing home at 1600 John Rolfe Parkway in Henrico County to say the girl had fallen down and was lethargic.

Several hours later, officials said the woman at the house called the nursing home again to tell her partner that the girl’s condition had not improved. The girl’s mother told the woman to bring the child to the nursing home.

Shortly after arriving at the nursing home, the child went into respiratory arrest.

She was taken to Henrico Doctors’ Hospital on Forest Avenue, where she died.

The case is being investigated by the city’s Child Death Investigation Team, which includes representatives from the Richmond Police Department and the commonwealth’s attorney’s office, the state medical examiner’s office, VCU Medical Center, and the city’s child-protective services and social services agencies.

Contact Jim Nolan at (804) 649-6061 or jnolan@timesdispatch.com.

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