COLORADO SPRINGS — For Rita Wiley, who works with young parents at Fort Carson, 2-month-old Harmone’e Elam’s death this month was a worst-case scenario.
Harmone’e showed no signs of abuse when she died at Memorial Hospital, police said. But an investigation later revealed she died of blunt-force trauma to her head and abdomen, leading police to arrest her 20-year-old father, Pfc. Roderick Elam Jr., on suspicion of child abuse resulting in death.
Harmone’e is the seventh infant or toddler in Colorado Springs to die this year in a suspected case of child abuse. Three of those deaths happened in late December, pushing the city homicide count to 32 in 2011.
“This isn’t the highest number, but it feels as if it is reaching an epidemic,” said Karen Logan, the child welfare manager for the El Paso County Department of Human Services.
In light of the recent spate of child deaths, 4th Judicial District Attorney Dan May said Friday that his office is pulling together a group of local professionals that will look for links in the deaths and focus on child-abuse prevention and outreach to stressed families.
Representatives from the Colorado Springs Police Department, Fort Carson and the county’s human services department have been or will be invited to participate.
“I think some of these are potentially preventable if we get the right information to the right people,” May said.
The circumstances of each child’s death have varied.
George Peters, a former Fort Carson soldier, was sentenced to 47 years in prison this month for the death of his 2-month-old son, Nicholas, who was the first child to die of abuse this year in Colorado Springs.
Prosecutors said Peters, who was strung out on heroin, used force to quiet Nicholas, killing him.
Since then, five children in Colorado Springs are thought to have died from blunt-force injuries. Another child, Erich Tyler Jr., was scalded to death when police suspect his mother, Estella Toleafoa, left the house to get cigarettes and chicken wings.
She faces 24 to 48 years in prison after pleading guilty to felony child abuse.
Though social workers and child advocates couldn’t talk specifically about each case — arrest affidavits in a few cases have been sealed under court order — they say a lack of awareness about support programs often precedes many child-abuse cases.
The tools to help young fathers such as Elam are in place, said Logan and Wiley, but parents must reach out for help — and they first must know that help is available.
“They’re offering the programs,” Logan said. “But they’re only as good as the family taking them.”
Fort Carson has several programs to help parents grapple with the challenges of parenthood: weekly parenting classes, play groups and regular access to home visitors like Wiley.
Logan said similar programs offered by DHS are not well-known. Therapy for parents and children involved in child-abuse cases is only mandatory by court order. Otherwise, it’s a question of parents’ willingness and ability to seek help themselves.
