5 Held in Puzzling Death of Toddler

SAN FRANCISCO -- Marin County authorities on Monday were trying to piece together “a complicated puzzle” involving a man and four women charged in the death of a toddler, a victim of suspected neglect and severe malnutrition. A dozen other children were removed from the group’s upscale suburban home.

The five suspects are scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday in Marin County Superior Court.

They were arrested Friday when the children, ranging from 8 months to 16 years old, were taken into custody after the adults were named in a grand jury indictment.

The adults are Winnfred Wright, 45; Carol Bremner, 44; Mary Campbell, 37; Deirdre Hart Wilson, 37; and Kali Polk-Matthews, 20.

All were indicted on charges of involuntary manslaughter and child endangerment. All except Polk-Matthews also were indicted on one count each of second-degree murder.

Investigators were called in Nov. 13 after two adults brought the toddler to Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in San Rafael.

The 19-month-old boy was later pronounced dead, and sheriff’s deputies were called because of a “lack of information supplied by the parents,” according to a Marin County Sheriff’s Department statement.

After the toddler’s death, authorities served multiple search warrants and seized numerous undisclosed items they said “show a pattern of ongoing mistreatment of the children,” who investigators say all suffered from varying degrees of malnutrition and neglect.

Most of the children had rickets, a softening of bones caused by lack of vitamin D or calcium, said Sheriff’s Deputy Fred Marziano.

He said none of the women is legally married to Wright, whom he described as unemployed.

“It’s definitely an odd arrangement,” Marziano said. “The only way I can describe it now is as a group of adults cohabitating in one home and producing children.”

Using blood samples and DNA testing, detectives have spent weeks trying to determine the relationships of the adults and children living in the home in the upper-middle class community of Marinwood, 20 miles north of San Francisco.

Authorities say Wright fathered all 13 children, including the deceased boy. The mothers varied, but included all four women.

“Due to the lack of cooperation from the adults living in the home, investigators were faced with piecing together a complicated puzzle in determining the parents of each of the children,” the Sheriff’s Department statement said.

Marziano said the suspects continue to be uncooperative. “Other than the first day or so after the child’s death, they have refused to talk to us,” he said.

On Monday, a neighbor said the group moved into the rented home about three years ago and immediately made it clear they preferred to keep to themselves.

“They seemed a strange lot--they were very private and kept to themselves and didn’t interact much with the rest of the neighborhood,” said Lynne Scofield, who lives a few doors away from the group’s two-story home.

Scofield said she never heard cries or anything out of the ordinary--even though she saw several children and different women around the home.

“I thought it was just a man and two women, and I assumed one was his wife,” she said. “They were such a private family, you stopped paying any attention to them after a while. They were so rarely out.”

The 12 other children were removed from the home by state child protective services workers and examined by doctors at UC San Francisco Medical Center.

Scofield said neighbors are upset about the events.

“We’re all in complete shock that they kept babies and so many children in that house,” she said. “This isn’t the kind of neighborhood where these terrible things happen.”