Closing Arguments Given in Parents’ Retrial

Bit by bit, they reconstructed Lindsay Gentry’s life--and what they believed caused the severely disabled 15-year-old girl to wither away and die.

“This was a child who was abused and neglected,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Kathleen Cady during closing arguments at the retrial of Lindsay’s parents. For years, Cady contended, Michael and Kathleen “Katrina” Gentry failed to give their daughter enough food, and the girl eventually starved to death.

Cady urged the jury to find the Gentrys guilty of involuntary manslaughter, child abuse and conspiracy. Their daughter, who Cady said resembled a “concentration camp survivor,” stood 4-feet-6 and weighed 44 pounds when she died in February 1996.

But the Gentrys’ defense lawyers argued that the parents provided food and went to lengths to care for their daughter, who suffered from myotonic dystrophy.

“They did not kill Lindsay, they did not abuse Lindsay, they did not conspire to abuse her,” said Deputy Public Defender Patrick Thomason, inside a Van Nuys courtroom packed with the Gentrys’ family and friends. Lindsay, he added, “died of her disease.”

Last year, a Van Nuys jury deadlocked on whether the Lake Los Angeles couple were guilty of murder. The Gentrys have maintained their innocence, rejecting at least three proposed plea bargains, the last of which would have allowed them to go free if they would admit guilt to a charge of child abuse. They face up to 10 years in prison if convicted on all counts.

On Monday before Los Angeles Superior Court Judge John S. Fisher, lawyers on both sides summed up the testimony during the monthlong trial.

Lindsay was a miracle baby who wasn’t expected to live long after her birth, Thomason said. But she survived until her teenage years, despite the disease that wasted her muscles, crooked her back and caused severe cataracts.

The disease made Lindsay vulnerable to abuse because it “masked” her injuries, Cady said. She recited abuse allegations--including a belt mark and a black eye found on the girl--made by teachers and school nurses dating back to 1987. Teachers gave the girl food because she seemed hungry, Cady said.

“All of the doctors agreed Lindsay was malnourished for the last five years of her life,” Cady said. She cited doctors who testified that malnutrition wasn’t a typical symptom of myotonic dystrophy unless a patient had swallowing or absorption problems, and tests showed Lindsay had neither. “The one explanation why she suffered from malnutrition was because she wasn’t getting enough food,” Cady said.

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But other experts testified that the girl had atrophied facial and throat muscles, which indicated chewing and swallowing problems, Thomason said.

Michael Gentry bought nutritional supplements for Lindsay, social workers saw that the Gentry home was stocked with food within the girl’s reach, and family friends saw the parents urging their daughter to eat, Thomason added.

“All of the evidence . . . points to concerned parents trying to help Lindsay stay alive,” Thomason said.

The Gentrys took their daughter to about 250 medical appointments in her lifetime, got her a back brace for her scoliosis, made her wear kneepads because her unsteady gait made her fall, had her see a nutritionist, and had her undergo cataract surgery, Thomason said. None of Lindsay’s health care providers reported abuse, and social workers who investigated allegations made by school employees found no evidence of neglect or abuse.

Lindsay’s teachers may have had an ax to grind against her father, who was pushy and made demands on the school, including Braille instruction for the girl, said defense lawyer M. David Houchin.

“They have shared feelings about Mr. Gentry--he was a pain,” Houchin said, adding that school employees also “shared an ignorance about [Lindsay’s] disease.”