OREGON CITY, Ore.
(RNS) Two members of an Oregon church that preaches faith-healing pleaded not guilty Monday (Aug. 30) to manslaughter charges for failing to provide medical care to their infant son, who died shortly after his premature birth.
Attorneys for Dale R. Hickman and Shannon M. Hickman entered the pleas. The Hickmans did not speak during the brief arraignment before Clackamas County Circuit Judge Jeffrey S. Jones.
Jones set a Nov. 19 trial date for the Hickmans, who are each charged with second-degree manslaughter. It is likely that the trial will be rescheduled for sometime next year.
The Hickmans, who attend the Followers of Christ church in Oregon City, posted 10 percent of their $500,000 bail and are out on bail. They requested that the bail amount be reduced. A separate hearing will be held on the request.
The Hickmans’ son was born in September 2009, about six weeks premature. He weighed 3 pounds, 5 ounces and lived nine hours. No one with medical training attended the birth, and no one called a doctor or ambulance. An autopsy determined the infant died of staph pneumonia and complications from a premature birth, including underdeveloped lungs.
A jury or judge will determine whether the Hickmans were criminally negligent and that their neglect caused the child’s death.
The death of the Hickman baby was the third faith-healing fatality involving children from the church in the past two and a half years.
– Steve Mayes
Copyright 2010 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written permission.
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posted August 31, 2010 at 7:55 pm
So sad. The mother probably had never even had any care from an OB, or any kind of Dr. The Church should be held accountable for their teachings that enable these parents to treat their children with so little regard, and the parents are responsible for this little babies care, and should be found so.
posted August 31, 2010 at 9:34 pm
If indeed that child had been born in a hospital he might have been saved. Smaller ones than that little one have been. The little one deserved a chance to live, and it is supposed to be up to the parents to at least try.
posted August 31, 2010 at 10:44 pm
This kind of thing keeps happening. If people want it to happen less they need to apply some real penalties.
Oh, and why are they out on bail after having paid 10% of it?
posted September 3, 2010 at 12:29 pm
You’re right nnmns this kind of thing keeps happening but more so in 3rd world nations, (I hate that term) it’s rare here.
posted September 4, 2010 at 8:57 pm
cknuck, it should never happen anywhere. At least here there is the possibility of punishment for allowing a child to die without at least trying to get medical help. Rare here? Apparently not in that “religious” community!
posted September 5, 2010 at 3:54 pm
pagan give me some numbers that move it from rare to prevalent
posted September 5, 2010 at 8:25 pm
You, cknuck, have read the same articles here on B’net that have told of this religious community’s child deaths because the parents haven’t gotten them help. One little girl was 18 months old, another young man was 16 I think, died because there was no medical help sought by the parents. And I think there was another young child who died young due to lack of medical help. ALL of these cases (and probably more) were “prayed” over and that alone obviously didn’t help. Notice in the previous post that I said it apparently wasn’t rare in that religious community.
posted September 6, 2010 at 11:10 pm
An Oregon paper a few yrs. back reported the Church had a cemetary of very young children, if I remember correctly it was between 40 to 80, PS.
posted September 7, 2010 at 12:49 am
What exactly does that mean H22 outside of the inference
posted September 7, 2010 at 9:13 pm
What does H22′s comment mean, cknuck? Lots of very young children died in that area for NO REASON. That’s pretty obvious.
posted September 8, 2010 at 9:05 pm
True that one is too many but what is a lot pagan
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posted September 10, 2010 at 4:54 pm
cknuck, a lot is more than one. Any child that dies needlessly, and that baby died needlessly. It wasn’t given a chance to survive.
posted September 16, 2010 at 1:45 pm
As always with these cases, if it would be considered manslaughter for parents to allow a child who is clearly in need of medical care to die because they opted to sit back and see if they just got better with time, it should be considered manslaughter for these folks. By merely praying for their child to get well, they did nothing more than take a “wait and see” approach with their baby’s life.
As for cknuck, what’s the point of your questions to pagan? If there were only 5 deaths of this nature nationwide, would you approve of it? Sounds like you’re being contrarian just because…well, just because. If you agree that one is too many, what exactly are you getting at?