https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...achine-and-died-then-her-mother-was-arrested/
A Sunday afternoon in October, while her mother — who was using prescription tranquilizers — was napping in their Arkansas home, 3-year-old Alexis Haney climbed into the washing machine and closed the lid.
The young children in the home told police they were used to helping with the laundry.
The washing machine, which the family used as a dirty clothes hamper, was programmed to switch on when the lid closed. After the clothes were clean, one child would climb into the open machine and pass the wet clothes to another, who would then toss them into the dryer.
Alexis closed the lid — and hot water started to pour in.
Authorities said she died from “scaling and thermal injuries,” according to a probable cause affidavit filed earlier this week in Calhoun County Circuit Court.
Brooke Haney, 25, from Hampton, a small town in southern Arkansas, has been arrested and charged with endangering the welfare of a minor in two separate incidents last year — one in which she is accused of driving with her 7-month-old child in the back seat while she was under the influence of prescription drugs, and the other in which the 3-year-old died, according to court documents.
Following a police investigation, authorities said they determined that she was on benzodiazepines, drugs most commonly used to treat anxiety and insomnia.