Michigan City parents charged with neglect after autistic daughter wanders away and drowns
LAPORTE — Charges have been filed against the parents of a 3-year-old autistic girl who drowned in a nearby lake after wandering away from her home in Michigan City last year.
Andrew Allen, 35 and Breanne Smith, 33, are charged in LaPorte Superior Court 1 with neglect of dependent resulting in death.
The level 1 felony offense carries a potential sentence of 20 to 40 years in prison.
According to court documents, both parents were home but not properly supervising the girl, Ivy Allen, when she went out the back door of the residence on May 12 on Long Beach Cove just north of U.S. 12.
The girl was found unconscious in Lake Clare about 45 minutes after her father reported her missing, police said.
She was taken to a hospital and later died.
According to court documents, there was a history of the girl leaving the home unattended and prior involvement by the Indiana Department of Child Services because of her straying from the residence.
The couple has two other young daughters, one with autism and the other with spina bifida, police said.
Smith allegedly told investigators Ivy returned to watching TV in the living room after breakfast, and she went to a bedroom and 15 minutes later discovered the patio door was open, police said.
A short time later, a police officer from nearby Long Beach spotted a woman resembling Smith near the small lake.
“It appeared that the woman was looking for someone,” said Michigan City Police Det. Anna Painter in her report submitted to the court.
According to police, Allen said he was asleep at the time of his daughter's disappearance.
Emergency responders were contacted after her parents were unable to find the child.
Allen said the girl opened doors often to venture outside but, usually, they found her quickly, according to court documents.
He said in this case, though, it was the longest she had disappeared, prosecutors alleged.
A few months prior to the girl’s death, police said, child welfare authorities gave the parents a home alarm system designed to go off whenever a door opened.
The parents hooked up the alarm system but it was not properly installed, police said.
In 2016, child welfare authorities first became involved with the family after Smith delivered a baby testing positive for THC, the active ingredient in marijuana, according to court documents.
Five years later, they were contacted again when Smith gave birth to a child testing positive for THC and Subutex.
The baby was showing signs of withdrawal from the Subutex often used to treat heroin and other forms of opiate dependence, authorities said.
A month after the drowning, police said, Allen tested positive for amphetamines and methamphetamines while the same drugs along with THC were found in Smith’s bloodstream.
LaPorte County Prosecutor Sean Fagan said the case was going to be presented to a grand jury last year to decide whether to seek charges.
He said it was never presented to the panel, though.
After taking over as prosecutor on Jan. 1, Fagan said, he and his staff members took a closer look and decided themselves the evidence was sufficient enough to pursue criminal allegations.
"We believe it was appropriate to go forward with charges," he said.
Allen and Smith were taken into custody Feb. 15 and ordered held in the LaPorte County Jail on $100,000 bond pending their initial court hearings.
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Autistic daughter wanders away and drowns, parents charged with neglect
