| Here
is a timelime of events surrounding Rebecca's death.
This account of the last week
of her short life is based on interviews, court statements and public records,
particularly the affidavit filed by State Trooper Anna Brookes in her application
for an arrest warrant.
By ELENI HIMARAS
The Patriot Ledger
WEDNESDAY, DEC. 7
Carolyn Riley took Rebecca
to Tufts New England Medical Center to see Dr. Kayoko Kifuji, the child
psychiatrist who had been treating her for almost two years for bipolar
disorder.
The doctor noted that Rebecca
was “doing really well.” Her father, Michael, had just moved back in with
the family in Hull and her mother thought that was good for the children.
Kifuji said if she continued
to show progress, she would reduce the amount of clonidine, a powerful
psychiatric drug, she was taking.
Later that day, a prescription
in her name for 35 clonidine tablets, a 10-day supply, was filled at Nantasket
Pharmacy in Hull.
THURSDAY, DEC. 8
This was the last day Rebecca
appeared healthy. Her uncle’s girlfriend, Kelly Williams, who lived with
the family, said she didn’t see her eat anything for the next four days.
FRIDAY, DEC. 9
Rebecca didn’t feel well. Her
father wasn’t home and she slept most of the day. She woke around 2 p.m.
and wandered into the kitchen.
She played with a bowl of cereal,
but didn’t eat much, if anything. Williams gave her a drink of Sunny D
fruit drink.
That night she started a raspy,
whooping cough that alarmed Williams and her boyfriend, James McGonnell.
SATURDAY, DEC. 10
Sometime in the afternoon,
Rebecca curled up in Williams’ lap. She was hot. Sweat had dampened her
hair and soaked her clothing. Williams changed her into dry clothes.
A little later, her mother
brought her a coffee mug holding an inch of cough syrup, many times the
recommended children’s dose.
Rebecca spit it out onto her
uncle in a coughing fit. Her mother gave her Tylenol.
Rebecca began wandering aimlessly
around the house, opening and closing the refrigerator door. The cough
persisted throughout the night and she became extremely congested. She
woke up several times.
SUNDAY, DEC. 11
Morning
Rebecca woke up with a slight
temperature and her mother gave her three children’s Tylenol.
Despite Rebecca’s illness,
her father insisted taking her to an appointment at the Social Security
office in Weymouth.
She vomited at the office.
Her mother rescheduled the appointment and the family went to Wal-Mart.
Rebecca waited in the car with her father while her mother went in to buy
Rebecca a Christmas outfit, some Pedialyte and a plastic bowl for her to
vomit into.
Rebecca threw up water, phlegm
speckled with Depakote, another psychiatric drug, all over the car.
Michael Riley stormed into
the house when they returned home, screaming and swearing. He turned his
anger towards Carolyn screaming, “Your daughter (expletive) threw up in
my car!”
He berated the little girl
for embarrassing the family at the appointment.
By now Rebecca was wearing
the new outfit from Wal-Mart, a deep green velvet dress with a wide white
collar. She posed with her mother for a snapshot.
Afternoon
Rebecca shuffled around the
house, looking lost. Her mother told Williams that she had made an appointment
with Rebecca’s pediatrician for the following day, but that was a lie.
The little girl threw up five
times that day and could not eat. At some point she took some children’s
Motrin, threw up again and told her mother she was feeling better. She
still couldn’t drink the Pedialyte her mother tried to give her, but managed
to drink some water.
Her mother said she just had
a cold.
MONDAY, DEC. 12
Morning
She felt a little better and
managed to eat some of a sandwich. Her coughing had quieted, but she was
increasingly incoherent.
She didn’t respond to people
calling her name. She spent most of the day watching television in her
parents room, regularly asking for “Mommy.” When her father came home,
he angrily sent her to her own room.
Every time she came out, she
was scolded and sent back to her room. She repeatedly returned as if she
had never heard him.
Afternoon and evening
Rebecca’s uncle, James McGonnell,
and Williams were becoming agitated. They had seen the Rileys neglect their
children’s medical needs before.
Around 4 p.m., McGonnell stormed
into their bedroom.
“If you won’t bring her to
the hospital, then I’ll beat you so the ambulance will come and take both
of you!” he yelled. He grabbed Riley by the shirt, but stopped short of
hitting him.
Instead, he smashed a wall
shelf and threw it down the hall. Her parents assured him she had an appointment
with the doctor the next day, another lie.
Night
While her parents were out
running errands, Rebecca was restless, calling out for her mother. When
Williams told her where her mother had gone, she just stared back, without
understanding. She was fidgety, her skin cool and sweaty.
She became unresponsive, even
when Williams stood in front of her and screamed her name. When she picked
her up, she was stiff.
The Rileys returned after 10
p.m. and dismissed Williams’ concern, assuring her they would take Rebecca
to the doctor. She was given clonidine and cold medicine and sent to bed.
McGonnell and Williams lamented
that they felt they couldn’t do anything for Rebecca because she wasn’t
their child, even though they had been alone with the girl for several
hours that evening.
Throughout the night Rebecca
coughed uncontrollably. She went into her parents room at least five times
and asked to sleep in their bed. Her father refused her each time.
“It got really annoying!” Riley
told police the next day. “Every time she woke up, Jimmy (McGonnell) came
pounding on the door.”
TUESDAY, DEC. 13
Early morning
Just before 1 a.m., McGonnell
was awakened by a telephone call. He heard Rebecca struggling to breathe,
“gurgling like something was stuck in her throat.”
He went into the room where
Rebecca was sleeping with her older sister, Kaitlynne, wiped some vomit
off her face and ran to her parent’s bedroom to tell them she needed help.
Carolyn Riley carried Rebecca into bed with her.
She gave her more Tylenol Cough
and Runny Nose and more clonidine, but as she lay on her mother’s chest
Rebecca could not stop coughing.
Her mother said she got her
a blanket and placed her on the floor with a sweatshirt for a pillow. Within
20 minutes, she quieted down. As her dad fell asleep, he heard her snore.
The pathologist who performed
Rebecca’s autopsy said the noise was more likely “agonal respirations”
- a death rattle.
6:36 a.m.
The alarm went off but the
Rileys were exhausted. They hit the snooze button several times. When Carolyn
Riley finally got up, she stepped over Rebecca to wake her 11-year-old
son, Gerard.
She came back to the room and
bent down to wake Rebecca. Her skin felt cool and rubbery and a frothy,
reddish bodily fluid covered her face.
Riley screamed for her husband.
He felt his little girl and knew at a touch that she was dead. They both
knew child cardio-pulmonary resuscitation, but did not perform it.
At 6:36 a.m., Michael Riley
called 911 and said, “I need an ambulance to 90 Lynn Ave. My daughter passed
away in the night.” The call lasted 23 seconds.
Investigators found the body
of a tiny girl with chocolate brown eyes and hair lying on top of magazines,
papers, clothing and a stuffed brown bear. A policeman covered her with
a blanket.
Rebecca was wearing only a
pink diaper and gold pierced stud earrings with colored stones. She had
bruises on her inner thighs, one on her outer thigh and several red marks
on her body. Inside her right bicep was thumbprint, as if an adult had
grabbed her arm.
As police questioned Michael
Riley, he became increasingly agitated at them for not allowing him to
give his two surviving children medication to calm them down. The officers
said the children were playing quietly, trading toys for play money. Riley
yelled at them to “calm down!” “knock it off!” and “stop being loud!”
Investigators found seven clonidine
tablets in the house. According to Rebecca’s medical records, there should
have been at least 75 left.
Return
To Rebecca's Story
For information
about preventing child abuse in the state of Massachusetts, click the links
below. If they can't help you, ask for someone who can. NEVER give
up looking for help for an abused child!
Call this number
to report child abuse ANY WHERE in the United States!
1-800-4-A-Child
1-800-422-4453
   
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