Strep Infection Cited in Death of Girl With Chickenpox

Orange County’s Public Health Laboratory has determined that a 5-year-old Fullerton girl died of a fast-moving and “apparently overwhelming strep infection” after a bout of chickenpox, a county health official said Wednesday.

Public Health Director L. Rex Ehling said the finding, made at the request of the sheriff-coroner’s office, should preclude any possible charges of neglect being lodged against the parents of Sandra Navarrete, who died 10 days ago as a relative tried to seek medical help.

“It seems to me that the implication I get is that there’s an investigation going on with parental neglect. With this information, that’s quite unlikely,” Ehling said.

Parents Relieved by News

Florencia Navarrete said Wednesday that she and her husband, Emilio, had been notified by authorities and were relieved by the news of the cause of their daughter’s death. She said the last few days had been full of guilt and soul-searching about why Sandra had died and whether they had done enough for her.

“We felt very bad,” she said. “In a city as large as this, with so many doctors, it appeared that we didn’t try hard enough to find help for our daughter. But do you think we wanted to lose our daughter? Of course not.

“I don’t know what happened. I am her mother, I was at her feet. I felt like I should have done more, but I couldn’t, and that it was my fault,” she said.

On Monday, Fullerton police said they and the county Social Services Agency were investigating Sandra’s death after the parents indicated they knew their daughter was seriously ill with chickenpox but did not seek medical care for her.

Florencia Navarrete said then that she and her husband did not take Sandra immediately to a hospital or clinic after she became ill March 22 because they had no money, didn’t speak English and didn’t know where to go. Sandra died March 28 as an uncle tried to drive her to a Long Beach hospital.

Fullerton Police Sgt. Don Kimbro had said the death fell into a “gray area,” and he was waiting for toxicological tests on the cause of death to help him decide if the Mexican immigrant couple were negligent.

Kimbro could not be reached for comment late Wednesday, but Fullerton Police Sgt. Jeff Roop said the medical finding will influence any decision by the district attorney’s office in regard to Sandra’s sudden death.

Asked if it would rule out prosecution of the parents for negligence, Roop said, “It makes it less likely, sure. . . . We never really had any strong suspicions. We were just investigating in a normal course” an unusual death.

Roop said his office still would collect reports from the coroner’s office and health officials and “review all circumstances with the district attorney.”

Ehling said he was releasing the information ahead of any release by the coroner’s office “for the parents’ peace of mind.”

“I don’t think I have all the facts in front of me, but on the surface, this would seem to rule out” any further suggestion of parental neglect, he said.

‘A Rare Complication’

Results of tests performed by the county’s health laboratory for the coroner’s office showed that she died of “a rare complication,” a severe streptococcus infection that also infected her brain, Ehling said.

“I will have my staff begin an investigation” to see whether the senior Navarretes and the family’s surviving three children had been tested for strep, he said. “It isn’t something which ordinarily causes death in a hurry but it can cause fairly severe illness,” he said, including rheumatic fever and kidney and heart complications.

Late Wednesday, Florencia Navarrete said she remains deeply saddened by her daughter’s death.

“The father (Catholic priest) told me that she is gone because God needed her,” she said.