A former foster mother cried tears of relief Friday when a Richmond County jury read the verdict in a murder case against her.
Elizabeth Osei was relieved when a jury decided she wasn’t culpable in the death of her first foster child, a 3-year-old disabled boy, according to the Augusta Chronicle.
She had been held in jail without bond since June 24, 2014, when a dose of morphine killed Kenyon Jay Slacks.
The licensed practical nurse worried about using a sedative on her “fragile” adopted son before an MRI on June 23, 2014, the newspaper reported.
After the Georgia Bureau of Investigation conducted a toxicology report, officials learned Slacks had morphine in his system.
The sole defense witness, an expert in pharmacology, told the jury Thursday that the state laboratory’s finding that Kenyon had enough morphine in his system to kill a man was bogus. Osei’s defense attorney argued she loved her son and had no motive to kill him.
If the death was the result of a mixed-up medication, defense attorney Pete Theodocion said, murder charges wouldn’t fit because the death was unintentional.
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