Tears for Omarie: Father heartbroken after three-year-old son dies; toxicology report ordered

Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­[email protected]

The death of three-year-old Omarie Richins has left a Ste Madeleine fam­i­ly dev­as­tat­ed and has prompt­ed a fa­ther’s ur­gent warn­ing to par­ents about check­ing on young chil­dren, even while they sleep.

“Al­ways check on your chil­dren, even while they are asleep,” said An­der­son Richins, whose son died on Mon­day morn­ing.

Clutch­ing his son’s Mick­ey Mouse stuffed toy at their home yes­ter­day, 58-year-old Richins strug­gled to ac­cept Omarie’s death.

“I miss him so much. I wish I could just hug him,” he said.

Richins, who per­formed CPR on his son for 20 min­utes while they wait­ed for the para­medics, be­lieves Omarie ate too much piz­za the night be­fore and suf­fo­cat­ed on his vom­it.

An au­top­sy at the San Fer­nan­do mor­tu­ary list­ed his death as cere­bral oede­ma, as­pi­ra­tion pneu­moni­tis and res­pi­ra­to­ry tract in­fec­tion.

Po­lice are al­so await­ing the re­sults of a tox­i­col­o­gy re­port fol­low­ing con­cerns that the child may have in­gest­ed drain wa­ter pos­si­bly con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed with ei­ther her­bi­cide or pes­ti­cide.

Richins ex­plained that al­though he and Omarie’s moth­er are no longer in a re­la­tion­ship, they live in the same house and sleep in sep­a­rate rooms.

Omarie slept with his moth­er, while their eight-year-old son slept in Richins’ room.

On Sun­day evening, Richins said he bought two piz­zas for his fam­i­ly. Omarie, he said, loved piz­za and ate about three slices, then an­oth­er slice and a half about an hour and a half lat­er. He al­so drank mau­by.

Some­time af­ter 8.30 pm, Omarie com­plained of stom­ach pains and a headache, but the fam­i­ly be­lieved he had eat­en too much piz­za.

Omarie’s moth­er told po­lice that around 2.30 am on Mon­day, he again com­plained of feel­ing un­well. She said he had a slight tem­per­a­ture and a run­ny nose.

Just be­fore 5 am, she dis­cov­ered that the tod­dler was un­re­spon­sive and soaked in vom­it and alert­ed Richins.

Richins, who is trained in CPR, re­called see­ing vom­it in his son’s nose and mouth and im­me­di­ate­ly be­gin­ning re­sus­ci­ta­tion, while para­medics guid­ed him over the phone.

Demon­strat­ing on the Mick­ey Mouse stuffed toy what he did, Richins said he did not blame Omarie’s moth­er, but urged par­ents to al­ways be vig­i­lant.

“When you have young kids and they eat, and even if you go­ing to sleep you must still get up and take a lil check. Put your hand by their nos­tril and stom­ach be­cause the eight-year-old who sleep with me, my hand al­ways check­ing on him.”

Richins said ear­li­er in the day Omarie had been with him in his bed­room when he asked to go by his moth­er. In­stead, he said the child went out­side and picked up a small cup from a drain.

When Omarie’s moth­er re­alised he was out­side, Richins said that be­fore she could get to him, the child had al­ready rinsed the cup, uri­nat­ed in it and put it to his mouth.

Al­though the tox­i­col­o­gy re­port is still pend­ing, Richins be­lieves that in­ci­dent did not cause his son’s death.

Richins, who has four oth­er chil­dren—the el­dest aged 35—said Omarie was born with low platelets and spent six weeks in hos­pi­tal. He lat­er de­vel­oped chest in­fec­tions on two oc­ca­sions.

Omarie’s moth­er was not at home when Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed.