SAN JOSE, Calif. -- A 220-pound woman who said she followed a counselor's advice and sat on her 9-year-old son to discipline him is innocent of smothering him to death, a Superior Court jury ruled.
Betty Mentry, 45, sobbed softly as the decison was read Tuesday in Santa Clara County Superior Court. The three-man, nine-woman jury deliberated two hours and 20 minutes.
'It was the only verdict they could have reached,' her attorney, Cyril Ash, said. 'She wasn't doing anything but following instructions from a family therapist.'
Mrs. Mentry testified a family counselor -- Jorge Sousa -- told her to drag the boy out of bed early in the morning, lay him down on the floor and 'sit on him just like he's a chair.'
She was charged with involuntary manslaughter, which carries a maximum sentence of four years in prison.
The acquittal opened the way for a $2.5 million wrongful death suit filed last month by Mrs. Mentry against Sousa and the Alum Rock Counseling Center, where he worked.
Mrs. Mentry testified during her five-day trial that she had gone to the center for help with her hyperactive son.
Steven Mentry died last May 31, on his ninth birthday, nine days after undergoing a 2 -hour allegedly prescribed 'treatment.'
Sousa, 29, denied advising Mrs. Mentry to sit on the boy. Instead, he testified, he told the woman to keep her weight on her knees and straddle her son.
Earlier in the trial, a licensed family counselor testifying as an expert witness said the disciplinary technique of sitting on hyperactive children was well known.
But the counselor, ArLyne M. Diamond, also testified Mrs. Mentry should not have been advised to use the technique because she was too inflexible to stop should something go wrong.
She characterized Mrs. Mentry as a woman with little common sense and 'poor judgment.'
Sousa characterized Steven as a 'very angry young child' who had a history of stealing from his mother, shoplifting, wetting the bed, playing with matches and fighting with other children.
He said he advised Mrs. Mentry to straddle the boy between her knees on the floor for as long as five hours or until she felt in control. Mrs. Mentry testified that Sousa instructed her to sit atop her son while she ate, talked on the telephone or listened to music.
She testified that every hour she was to ask the boy who was in charge. She said she was told not to show any pity even if Steven yelled and screamed.
She used the technique four times.
During the last episode, she said, Steven screamed and struggled and 'then all of a sudden he was quiet.'
The boy lapsed into a coma and died nine days later while on life-support systems at Kaiser Hospital in Redwood City. He died of asphyxia, chest compression and pneumonia.
