In November of last year, Seth Jackson, an adoptive and foster parent, plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter. Just four months earlier he left his 10-month-old foster daughter strapped in her car seat in his car. After two hours of watching TV and smoking pot, he remembered she was in the car, went to check on her, and found her dead.
The three other foster children and two adoptive children in his and his partner’s care have been removed from their home.
Filled with emotion, Seth plead with the court to be lenient, “Your honor, I’m a broken man, pleading here for my life. I’m not a monster, and I don’t deserve to rot in a prison cell.”
Yet the judge was not lenient. The prosecution asked for 32 months and that is exactly what Jackson was given. The judge said that he believes the child’s death was not intentional and that it was an accident. But driving while drunk and doing drugs was not accidental — it was intentional. And it was those intentional actions that lead to the death of an innocent child. Because of those actions, Jackson received the 32-month prison sentence.
Jackson has 14 days to appeal.
