The foster parents of a 4-year-old child who died earlier this month appeared in court on Thursday morning for their arraignment.
According to Canton Municipal Court records, Demetres S. Givens and Jamie L. Thompson are both charged with involuntary manslaughter, a first-degree felony and endangering children, a second-degree felony.
The child's biological mother told News 5 that Givens was her brother and a kinship caregiver for the boy and that she trusted him to care for her son as part of a case plan in family court. She recalls last seeing her son at Christmas time in 2023.
On May 5, Canton Police said officers responded to a home on Gilbert Circle NE for a little boy who was found in his bed and wasn't breathing.
A police report states Thompson told officers the boy had autism and was her adoptive son, and the child couldn’t keep food down from an eating disorder. She stated the child had been on a liquid diet.
Thompson said that her fiancé, the child's uncle, went to check on the boy around 9:30 p.m. and found him in his crib with vomit nearby.
EMS transported the child to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Court records state the child was starved, which had led to an "agonizing slow death."
An arrest warrant was issued for the foster parents, and they were taken into custody after they were found in their car in the jail's parking lot. After being arrested, the couple told authorities they were about to surrender to police.
The magistrate presiding over the case issued a $1 million bond each for the foster parents. A future court date hasn't been set.
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