SANTA ANA, Calif., May 19 (UPI) -- A grand jury in Southern California said Wednesday that the starvation death of a 13-year-old Orange County girl could have been prevented.
The Orange County Register said the panel determined that better communications and a more-aggressive investigation of the case of Samantha Gutierrez might have prevented her death in 2002.
The grand jury found that Orange County police and social services officials visited the Gutierrez home six times before Samantha's death to investigate child-abuse reports. However no recommendations that she be removed from the home were ever made, and written reports weren't filed after some of the visits.
Samantha's mother was sentenced to eight years in prison for her daughter's death.
