1 week Ago By Mike Jones
A Washington County jury will have to decide whether a Monongahela mother was negligent and reckless when her 13-day-old son died while sleeping in bed with her nearly two years ago, or whether it was a tragic, unexplained death that could not have been prevented. The homicide trial for 24-year-old Darian Helmantoler began Tuesday morning in Washington County Court of Common Pleas, with prosecutors and her defense attorney painting very different pictures about what led to her son Asher’s death in the early morning hours of Sept. 12, 2023.
First Assistant District Attorney Leslie Mylan said during her opening statements that Helmantoler had been up late drinking the night before, and then had her infant son sleep next to her in bed on a “boppy pillow,” which is a small cushion with an indentation that cradles a baby. “She made a decision that night that forever ended her son Asher’s life,” Mylan said. “He would never learn to smile, never learn to take his first steps or learn to say his first words.
” Mylan said Helmantoler’s decision to drink the night before and then “co-sleep” with her infant son contributed to his death. Helmantoler woke up the next morning and found Asher unresponsive and not breathing, with blood pouring from his nose when she picked him up to hold him. “She took that newborn with her – despite drinking that night – to bed,” Mylan said.
“As a mother, she had one fundamental duty: Protect her child.” But Helmantoler’s defense attorney, Michael DeRiso, argued that his client had nothing to do with Asher’s death, and that the Washington County coroner and a private forensic pathologist hired by the prosecution both could not determine the manner in which he died. “She woke up that morning expecting to spend that day with her 13-day-old son,” DeRiso said.
“It didn’t happen.” Instead, DeRiso said, investigators first began searching for blunt force objects inside her Monongahela apartment, thinking she had bludgeoned the child. But when Asher’s autopsy revealed he had died from sudden infant death syndrome – and the prosecution’s private pathologist later similarly determined it was an unexplained sudden death – DeRiso said they began searching for other explanations through “confirmation bias” to justify the homicide charge.
“They have created a theory that is not supported by any medical or forensic evidence. And they’re going to prosecute that woman over there for murder,” DeRiso said, pointing to his client. “They’re all in.
The district attorney’s office is going to gaslight you. It’s coming.” The prosecution called Dr.
Edward Mazuchowski, a forensic pathologist based in Allentown, as its first witness to discuss how several factors could have contributed to Asher’s death. He reviewed the case and determined the cause of death as unexplained sudden death, with the co-sleeping arrangement and Helmantoler’s drinking that night raising the risk factors for “overlay” with the baby in the bed. But he said there was no direct evidence that the baby died from asphyxiation, although he could not rule that out as a possibility.
“A ‘boppy pillow’ would not necessarily be a safe sleep environment for a 2-week old,” Mazuchowski said. During cross-examination, DeRiso tried to draw comparisons to Mazuchowski’s ruling of unexplained sudden death to the coroner’s finding that the baby died from SIDS. “The difference is the terminology.
We’ve moved away from calling it SIDS,” Mazuchowski said of different factors that can lead to differing conclusions. Helmantoler’s 911 call was later played for the jury in which she sounds hysterical while talking to a dispatcher, but she refused to perform CPR on the baby. Helmantoler dabbed tears from her face while the call was played in the courtroom.
“Do you want to try CPR?” the dispatcher said while offering instructions on how to perform the resuscitation technique. “No, I don’t trust myself,” Helmantoler responded. About 30 seconds later, paramedics arrived and took Asher’s lifeless body into their ambulance as they tried to resuscitate him in a futile effort to save the child.
The medics then notified City of Monongahela police officers at the scene that the baby’s condition was suspicious, leading police to question Helmantoler and investigate the death. Testimony on Tuesday got heated at times with DeRiso and Washington County District Attorney Jason Walsh sparring during several moments. At one point, Walsh objected to DeRiso’s line of questioning and the two men began arguing, leading Judge Traci McDonald to order them to stop speaking before she brought all parties over for a sidebar in an attempt to cool the tensions in the courtroom.
Helmantoler, who is free on $250,000 unsecured bond, is facing charges of homicide, child endangerment, reckless endangerment and three counts of aggravated assault..
