Long Island parents charged with manslaughter after toddler OD’d on?lethal cocktail?of cocaine, fentanyl and heroin
A Long Island couple was indicted on manslaughter charges after their toddler allegedly overdosed on their drug stash – as the local prosecutor called for new laws to prevent similar tragedies.
Wilkens Adonis and Daryllee Leibrock, both 38, had already faced a litany of drug and weapons charges after the Jan. 3 death of 14-month-old Joseph Adonis, who was killed by a lethal cocktail of cocaine, fentanyl and heroin.
But on Monday, Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney announced a superseding indictment that formally charged the Holbrook couple in the child’s death.
“Fourteen-month-old Joseph Adonis died from an overdose due to ingesting a cocktail of heroin, cocaine, and fentanyl,” Tierney said in a statement.
“How many more innocent children must die for change to be enacted?” he asked. “It is well past the time for New York State legislators to wake up, put politics aside, and pass common sense legislation related to fentanyl.”
The pair were arraigned Monday on the new charges, which include second-degree manslaughter, Tierney said.
Acting Supreme Court Justice Philip Goglas ordered them both held on $500,000 cash bail, $1 million bond or $5 million partially-secured bond, the statement said.
Their next court date is May 14.
The couple allegedly had a slew of drugs and a cache of weapons inside their central Long Island home, which cops raided two days after New Year’s after a report of an unresponsive child inside one of the bedrooms.
Authorities rushed the little boy to Stony Brook University Hospital, but he didn’t make it.
Detectives from the Suffolk County Police Department’s Homicide Squad allegedly found narcotics and paraphernalia in the same room the child lay in, the statement said.
In the end, cops said they found more than an eighth of a heroin and fentanyl mixture, an eighth of cocaine, alprazolam, methadone, drug packaging materials, two digital scales, an electronic stun gun, a loaded shotgun and a rifle.
Everything was lying in the open, easily accessible to the little boy and his 11-year-old sibling, investigators said.
A DNA swab taken from one of the drug packages showed traces of the toddler’s DNA, authorities added.
“Based on the results of the autopsy, the drugs and weapons allegedly found in the defendants’ apartment, and the location of those items, the defendants are now alleged to have recklessly caused the death of their son, Joseph Adonis,” the statement said.
At the time of their arrest, both parents had failure to appear warrants after missing court dates for misdemeanor drug charges, Tierney said.
Leibrock also faced criminal contempt charges, as she violated a restraining order that was supposed to bar her from being around either child.
But Tierney added that it was only the addition of the manslaughter charge that let prosecutors ask for bail in this case.
