UPDATE 6/18/08 - The prosecution has decided not to seek the death penalty in this case, citing mental health concerns and the parents each blaming the other for baby Benjamin’s death. That said, I’m hopeful that life in prison will include a few days in a restraint chair for this pair of heinous babykillers.
Peoria, IL - Few parents deserve a good old fashioned smiting like Tracey Hermann and James Sargent. Hermann, 21, and Sargent, 23, are accused of killing their five month old son Benjamin by leaving him his carseat for eight days. Benjamin was dropped off with his parents on February 4, strapped into his carseat. He was found dead on February 12 in the exact same position. Oh, can we think of appropriate punishments for these two? I think we can.
Our poster Pirelli Jones actually hit me to this story several days ago, but at the time, there was no clear cause of death. But on Wednesday, this pair of neglectful douchebags were in court on charges of first degree murder.
Peoria County State’s Attorney Kevin Lyons said that baby Benjamin “died from starvation due to neglect from these two defendants, his parents. It’s the worst case of child neglect we have seen since the turn of this century.”
Lyons said police found Benjamin sitting in his own waste, all the while strapped into the seat which was in a crib. Benjamin weighed just ten pounds when he was found, even though he’d weighed in at eight pounds at birth. During the eight days that Benjamin was dying, strapped in the seat, both Hermann and Sargent were home at various times, just hanging out and playing video games and going about their daily routines. The couple also have a three-year-old daughter.
Excuse me, I need a WTF moment. WTF?!? How do you just forget about a tiny baby for over a week? I don’t have the proper profanity right at hand for these two. Poor baby Benjamin. He died with his eyes open, fists clenched, wearing a zipped up blue snowsuit in a room where the temperature was about 80 degrees.
A person who was staying at an unattached garage apartment next to the house had seen Benjamin at one point, thought it was “odd” that he was still on the living room floor after being dropped off and moved him, car seat and all, into the other room where he was placed in the crib. Benjamin was found in the same position the neighbor had left him in over a week before.
Sargent told police that he had moved Benjamin “once or twice,” but later said that he might not have moved Benjamin at all during the week. Hermann last saw her son the night before police were notified. And get THIS - she allegedly told police she “looked at the baby in the crib and presumed he was sleeping so she said she stuck a bottle between the baby and the side of the car seat so that when he woke up, he could grab it and feed himself,” said prosecutor Lyons.
Hermann then left for Iowa to meet with a man she had met online, Lyons said, noting that she allegedly told police “that Benjamin was not her duty and that it was James’ responsibility.” Guess he didn’t take that responsibility very well, but Hermann was home for part of the time, and she didn’t take that responsibility either, apparently.
Herrman and Sargent are currently being held without bond on first-degree murder charges. Their three-year-old daughter, Natalie Grace, has been removed from the family’s custody by CPS and is in foster care. Herrman and Sargent, by all rights, should be in Hell.
Thanks to Pirelli Jones, Ells, and Kathy for their help with this story, and Ells for the pics.
199 responses so far ↓
Pages: [1] 2 3 4 » Show All
1
utterdisbelief
Feb 21, 2008 at 5:52 pm -This is my first post, and i can’t even begin to understand people. How do you even try to justify this???? So she stuck a bottle beside him- wow! Big deal! What a mom…..
2
ells9824
Feb 21, 2008 at 5:52 pm -I have never seen 2 more cracked out looking mugshots in my life.
I hope their jailer puts food just out of reach,in case they’re hungry when they wake up. If they bother to feed them that is. But nooooooooooo that would be cruel and unusual.
3
mm_classy
Feb 21, 2008 at 5:54 pm -This is disgusting! OMG how that poor baby must have suffered. Just when you think you’ve heard it all, or the worst case possible some one new comes along and reachs a whole new level of twisted sickness.
How horrible for that little baby.
4
impqueen
Feb 21, 2008 at 5:55 pm -Welcome to DD, hope you’ll hang around. We’re an interesting bunch.
As to the story, well, I dunno if there’s a Hell hot enough for these two.
5
Kathy
Feb 21, 2008 at 5:58 pm -I didn’t help, except to ask TalkingJesus to poof her uterus away and make him impotent.
Seriously though, they are no words to describe how selfish and uncaring these two are. I think I have more loathing for her for giving birth to two children when she had no intention to care for them. Someone should teach her to keep her fat legs closed.
Somehow, I think prison isn’t going to be much of a change for them, except for the fact that she can’t go off and make any more babies. From the looks of their complexions, I don’t think they got outside much.
6
TalkingJesus
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:02 pm -I really think putting them in Depends, and strapping them in a restraint chair before the trial is the only fair thing to do here. Seems fitting, I think.
7
impqueen
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:05 pm -here’s an old Myspace of Tracy’s - nothing that interesting, since it’s mostly blank. I wonder if she has a Fubar account.
http://profile.myspace.com/ind.....d=81242836
8
nurseronda
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:06 pm -Both of these idea’s are the best when put together, so that they would know exactly what they put that poor baby through.
9
impqueen
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:08 pm -here’s HIS Myspace. Holy cats.
http://profile.myspace.com/ind.....=310720782
10
impqueen
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:13 pm -and her current Myspace is:
http://profile.myspace.com/ind.....d=60471613
11
nurseronda
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:14 pm -Impqueen, hers is the first friend, ” Normalcy is a state of mind” There is a pic of the baby there in her profile….
12
ells9824
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:20 pm -“if by my life or death i can protect you i will”
Too bad that didn’t apply to your child, ass waffle.
13
mm_classy
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:31 pm -in her blurb is says, Number of things in my Past I Regret: i’d say not enough
Well damn!! Now you have a HUGE one. Was she just saving up so she could really do it right? Stupid bitch.
Oh she calls her self a proud parent. Seriously, THIS is not my definition of a proud parent. Sick fuck!
14
impqueen
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:32 pm -15
impqueen
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:41 pm -16
ells9824
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:46 pm -Oh oh oh oh… that pic of him a little bit older. I’m not that far away. Give me these damn babies.
17
impqueen
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:49 pm -right there with ya, Ells.
And what the hell? You know that poor baby cried and cried at first until he had no strength left. How loud does the music have to be to drown out a screaming infant? And the poor little sister, you know she must have wondered what was wrong.
18
ells9824
Feb 21, 2008 at 6:56 pm -I’m not really a violent person, but I would love to kick her in the head. Him,too, but her especially. Her myspace is obnoxious, on 2/20/08, about a week after she starved her baby to death, she was “animated”.
19
colomom
Feb 21, 2008 at 7:20 pm -I think she’s mostly blank….
20
Harley_Tech
Feb 21, 2008 at 7:27 pm -For him…..
For her
not sure if I’ve used the right code…html or img???
R
Edit:
The correct answer is…..img - Morbid
21
ells9824
Feb 21, 2008 at 7:30 pm -You are a right thinking kind of guy Harley
22
ells9824
Feb 21, 2008 at 7:37 pm -Just shoot Morbid and/or Imp a message about which thread, they’ll clean it up for you.
23
Morbid
Feb 21, 2008 at 7:43 pm -I am just happy to know that there is a God above who found it necessary, in His Great Scheme Of Things, to allow this to happen to one of His creations:
On February 12, 2008, Peoria Police responded to a call at 3012 W. Proctor Street in Peoria. Found dead and strapped in a car seat that had been placed in a crib was 5-month-old Benjamin Sargent. Benjamin was wearing a blue snow suit. It was zipped up. The temperature in the room was near 80 degrees. Benjamin’s eyes were open, his hands were clenched in a fist-like position and, although dead, his eyes were staring straight ahead. Police investigation and medical and pathological examination would reveal that Benjamin had been strapped into this car seat and had not left it in eight days. All waste and urine had collected beneath him and his buttocks, legs and back were eaten into by the resulting poison.
Ah, that crazy Lord of ours…he truly does work in mysterious ways.
24
Harley_Tech
Feb 21, 2008 at 7:49 pm -Morbid,
I’m by no means a religious kind of guy, but maybe it was not our lord that let it happen….just maybe the devil was in control instead. just sayin.
Sorry about the screwed up attempts at posting pics…can you clean up after me? AS a side note, it would be ultra kewl if we could go back and delete our own screw ups…I’ve been known to make more than just a few of those…
R
25
WryBread
Feb 21, 2008 at 7:58 pm -Both the parents look subnormal mentally, certainly emotionally. I don’t get it. If you don’t want the kid, leave at a hospital. Or bring it to my house. At least I know enough to feed the baby and find someone who can take good care of it.
26
LL44
Feb 21, 2008 at 8:00 pm -oh those bags of shit… SERIOUSLY… 8 friggin’ days this baby suffered? In his own waste, eating away at him?
I have just undergone 2 in-vitro procedures to help an infertile couple (both failed)… yet these breeders make babies and kill them.
There is no humanity in this world. I want to cry!
My 8 month old who is WAY advanced on her milestones still cannot hold a bottle, never mind fish it out of her seat while restrained…
I can’t stand it.
27
Harley_Tech
Feb 21, 2008 at 8:10 pm -See, this is the way I think. Let the manner the child died decide how the incubator and sperm donor die.
R
28
Nanette
Feb 21, 2008 at 8:22 pm -I feel so sick to my stomach right now, and tears are welling up in my eyes for this precious life that was just fucking IGNORED by these two!
/agree - I don’t think the Lord had much of anything to do with this either
29
Morbid
Feb 21, 2008 at 9:04 pm -I’ll be adding editing capabilities soon. It’s on my To-Do list.
30
colomom
Feb 21, 2008 at 9:05 pm -Legislate!!! I am in agreement HT, 100%.
Best suggestion I have heard all….decade.
31
crunchieapple
Feb 21, 2008 at 10:26 pm -There should be more public announcements out there about “adoption as an option”….if you don’t think you even want a baby, then give the baby up to a loving couple who want to love and cherish a little baby as their own….just a quick signature and you give up your rights to the infant.
I can’t even imagine what this poor little baby went through during those 8 days…the diaper rash he endured in the 1st few days, the hunger, and becoming dehydrated…this makes me so sad, I just want to cry!
32
feisty76
Feb 21, 2008 at 11:45 pm -WTF? Benjamin WAS her duty! Beyond a duty or a chore, he was her child! !!!!!Un-fucking-believable. I have seen a lot of posts that make my skin crawl, but this one is mind numbing. He must have cried, he must have screamed…how do you not respond to your own child’s pain? Especially if it’s of your own making? DAMN IT! How can you give birth to another life–a defenseless, little creature and just throw him away? He suffered in his own waste for 10 days. He had the horrendous luck of being born to a couple of fucktards. Blecht.
33
Hippiepoet
Feb 21, 2008 at 11:51 pm -OMFG Reading that was like being hit in the head with a sledgehammer. Holy fuck. I’ve read a lot of stuff here that has made me cry, this one though, shit fire. I am angry, and I cannot stop picturing that baby in my mind. This is so cruel, so unnecessary.
I want them to see how it feels to be in the same position, but then that seems as cruel as what those two asshats did.
I remember in Nursing School (1982/1983) when restraints were still readily used in Long Term Care Nursing Facilities, we as students were restrained for 30 min. to see how it felt. 30 min. in a chest restraint, strapped into a chair. I am an antsy fuck and thought it horrible; and I never forgot that as a nurse. 8 days in a car seat with a snow suit on, goddammit!
Nope, there is no god that controls things, or makes things happen. There is no god to stop the bad people or bad things from happening. It is just us, us crazy humans, who are fucked up to the max.
34
Miss. Hill
Feb 22, 2008 at 12:07 am -I really have no words…just utter disgust!
35
Luvin_life
Feb 22, 2008 at 1:53 am -WOW what a sad case of not giving two shit’s about your child, but why do this to her son and not her daughter, does anyone know of abuse on grace, or was it just on the baby?
36
Unamused Cat
Feb 22, 2008 at 2:24 am -This breaks my heart. I would have taken that baby in a heart beat.
37
So Jaded
Feb 22, 2008 at 3:22 am -Man….this one hurt. Badly.
First it was pain…now it’s just anger.
To think of the way that poor little guy suffered. As hard as I try, I can’t get this one out of my head.
38
Stephanie
Feb 22, 2008 at 7:35 am -Holy shit. These people are from my city.
I feel really dirty.
39
Stephanie
Feb 22, 2008 at 7:47 am -Actually, around here, flyers are everywhere as well as billboards, a couple of commercials air and signs in the courthouses (in the schools too, if I remember right). I don’t know what the hell was wrong with these people.
Peoria and the surrounding areas have been having a lot of things like this happening actually, now that I think about it.
40
Modine Gunch
Feb 22, 2008 at 8:43 am -Who the heck left this baby with those people. Someone else needs to take responsibility here!
41
Modine Gunch
Feb 22, 2008 at 8:47 am -I’m pro-life, but it seems to me abortion would have been a better deal for this little guy. I’ll bet that mom says she doesn’t believe in abortion! Yuk!
42
impqueen
Feb 22, 2008 at 8:47 am -Modine, the charging affidavit says it was a grandmother.
I know, right? Why would you even give a kid back? Especially since, according to the same prosecutor, the mother had essentially “given her three year old daughter away” to a relative and the house was in such disarray that there was spoiled food on surfaces and trash was ’stacked’ in the house.
I’m gonna go with drug-induced haze as a causative factor here. And then i’m gonna go scrub every surface in my house.
43
Modine Gunch
Feb 22, 2008 at 8:53 am -You know, we had a couple like that in my family and the grandparents found that poor baby sitting on the porch in the carseat….mom was at a stripping job making enough $$ for the next fix. Grandad took that baby inside and called family services. Long story short, he and Granma got the little thing and now the kid’s in high school and doing great. Parents not so hot, tho…..
44
jennbeee
Feb 22, 2008 at 9:18 am -This is truly one of the saddest stories I’ve ever read. Didn’t they hear the baby SCREAMING? That must have been so painful. The description of his lying there, eyes open as he met death…it’s just too much. I hope they get general population and are taught a thing or two about pain.
45
ccomfort
Feb 22, 2008 at 9:21 am -i think i could throw up. or gouge my eyes out after reading about these sick wastes of space.
all i want to do right now is go home and hold my son.
i’m thinking it would have been better if HER mom had had the abortion.
46
pms.247
Feb 22, 2008 at 10:13 am -On her myspace site, she answers some survey questions. One being: Your Weakness:
Her reply: being too nice
If that’s nice, I’d hate to see her when she’s just fucked up mean.
47
momoftwins
Feb 22, 2008 at 10:29 am -I think of all the horrible things I have ever seen and heard in my life, this is one of the worst. It’s almost impossible to describe just how horrible this really is. It makes me sick. Poor little precious man. Rest in peace, sweet baby.
48
MizL
Feb 22, 2008 at 10:36 am -I had shied away from commenting on this one, because there’s almost no words to express my disgust. So many of these cases bring me to tears, but this one really hits hard. As someone else said - un-fucking-believable!
8 days??? Neither parent even thought about this baby, who had to have been screaming his little head off, except to put a bottle near him? WTF?? It’s obvious that the parents cared nothing for this child. And what about the neighbor? I know that it was not his responsiblity, but the neighbor could have saved this babys life! He was aware enough to think it was odd that the baby had not been moved, and put the baby - carseat and all - in the crib? Why didn’t the neighbor say something to the parents about it? Call the police?
Ugh. So many questions… but what does it matter now? Nothing can change the suffering that poor little baby exprienced. Nothing can change the fact that he was neglected to death by the very people who were supposed to love and care for him.
49
Kathy
Feb 22, 2008 at 10:39 am -Bwa-hahahahaha!
50
solange822001
Feb 22, 2008 at 10:48 am -Jesus christ, I am speechless. Completely speechless. The only thing that gives me a bit of comfort is reading your comments and seeing that most of us feel the same way. Sometimes you read these stories and wonder if you are the only one with a heart out there
Pages: [1] 2 3 4 » Show All
You must log in to post a comment.