W.Va. parents arrested after infant dies from fatal amount of alcohol in her system

BRAXTON COUNTY, W.Va. (TCN) — A 23-year-old woman and 34-year-old man were arrested this week after investigators learned they gave their infant daughter alcohol almost daily for a month, leading to her death.

Braxton County records show Angel Talbert and James Smith are both charged with child neglect, conspiracy against the state, and first- and second-degree murder.

According to court records cited by WBOY-TV, on Nov. 16, 2024, Braxton County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to the local hospital regarding a child’s death and spoke with the medical examiner, who said the child’s face “was discolored as if the baby had been face-down.” Talbert and Smith told deputies that he woke up at around 4 a.m. and noticed the baby wasn’t breathing. Smith attempted CPR while Talbert called an ambulance.

The child went into the ambulance at 5:15 a.m. and was pronounced deceased at 5:32 a.m. Talbert and Smith reportedly both told detectives that their daughter had not been sick prior to her death.

WBOY reports deputies went into Talbert and Smith’s home and noted the “very poor” conditions, including cockroaches “crawling in multiple places throughout the home” and a lack of running water in the kitchen and bathroom. They also found an “apparatus” that Smith and Talbert used to smoke marijuana.

The medical examiner’s office sent a postmortem report to the Braxton County Sheriff’s Office on April 10 that said the child had a liver ethanol level of 3.210. That amount is reportedly fatal for an infant.

In an April 16 interview with detectives, Talbert reportedly said Smith would rub alcohol on their child’s gums and around her mouth “when the infant would get irritable and fussy.” He later admitted that they both put alcohol in her mouth “almost every day for a month prior to the infant’s death.”

Talbert and Smith are in custody at the Central Regional Jail without bond.

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