The parents of a two-year-old girl have been charged with murder after she died of a fentanyl overdose in San Francisco.
District Attorney Brooke Jenkins announced the fresh claims against Michelle Price and Steve Ramirez Wednesday, on top of original charges of felony child endangerment.
Jenkins claimed the parents were “fully aware of the dangers of fentanyl” but allegedly still left it within their child’s reach in February.
The girl, who has not been named, had been born with fentanyl in her system, with prosecutors alleging her parents were both drug users.
She had been hospitalized for the first few months of her life and her parents had kept Narcan in their apartment in case someone overdosed.
Jenkins, who has vowed to crackdown on the drug epidemic in northern California, told the SF Chronicle: “There’s no question that they understood its lethality, that they understood the harm it had caused this child when she was born.”
She added: “Still, (they) made a choice to continue to expose her to it, and expose her in grave and consistent ways.”
San Francisco Police Department officers found the child deceased on February 12 after a 911 call for a child not breathing, according to the San Francisco DA’s office.
Responding medics noted the child exhibited signs of rigor mortis and lividity, suggesting she had been dead for hours.
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Officers also observed drug paraphernalia, a used Narcan container on the bed, fentanyl and bottles of spoiled milk.
Both parents were arrested and had “high levels” of fentanyl and meth in their systems at the time. The child was determined to have died of “acute fentanyl toxicity.”
Ramirez allegedly tried to flee the scene at the time and resisted arrest, tacking on more charges for himself.
Assistant District Attorney Leigh Frazier wrote in a February 14 motion that Child Protective Services was aware of neglect involving the child but they failed to prevent more neglect.
He said: “Prior CPS supervision, formal interventions, and monitoring failed to prevent continued neglect, ongoing drug use in the residence, and ultimately the death of the child.”
The case remains an active investigation. The parents’ next hearing is scheduled for Thursday.
