Charges expected in death of infant

Second-degree murder charges were expected to be filed today against a mother and her boyfriend in connection with the child abuse death of the woman's 7-month-old infant.

The infant died Sunday after spending the day in the rear of an older model panel truck that lacked air conditioning while the adults drove around town looking for recyclable material to sell for cash, investigators said.

"There were a lot of things that could have been done but they didn't do them," Clark County District Attorney Stewart Bell said Monday.

In addition to the murder charges against the two adults, Bell said they also will be charged with felony child abuse and neglect with substantial bodily harm.

The pair were arrested after the child's death and are still in custody.

Bell said he was filing the charges because the two knew they had the child in the hot vehicle with no ventilation when the mother could have stayed home with the child, or when they learned the child was having difficulty breathing, they could have taken it to a cool environment.

"But they continued to collect cans," Bell said.

Bell differentiated this case from one two years ago when a child died from the heat after being left in a car for several hours by its mother.

In that case, Bell noted, the woman forgot the child was in the back seat.

"These people knew they were putting the child in harm's way and did nothing about it," Bell said.

In January of this year Bell filed felony neglect charges against a couple who are alleged to have left their three small children home alone while they went shopping, and while they were gone their home caught on fire and two of the three children died.

Three charges of felony child neglect were filed against Armondo Gonzales, 30, and Elvira Guardado-Gonzales, 28.

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