Kristel Candelario is a killer from Ohio who would be convicted of the murder of her infant daughter
According to court documents Kristel Candelario decided that she wanted to go on vacation and decided the best thing to do with her one year old daughter Jailyn Candelario was to leave her in a playpen unattended, for ten days
When Kristel Candelario came back from vacation she would find Jailyn Candelario not breathing and would call 911. Jailyn Candelario would be found dead by emergency personnel in her heavily soiled playen
An autopsy of Jailyn Candelario would reveal the one year old had died from starvation and dehydration
Kristel Candelario would be arrested and would later plead guilty to aggravated murder and endangering a child. When she faces sentences later this year she faces up to life in prison
Kristel Candelario Case
A Cleveland woman who left her 1-year-old daughter home alone in a playpen for 10 days while she went to Detroit and Puerto Rico last summer pleaded guilty on Thursday to aggravated murder in the child’s death.
Kristel Candelario also pleaded guilty to a charge of endangering children in the death of her daughter, Jailyn Candelario. She faces a potential sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Prosecutors dropped two murder charges and a felonious assault charge in exchange for the plea.
Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Judge Brendan Sheehan will sentence her on March 18.
Candelario, 32, left the infant in her home near West 97th Street and Lorain Avenue on June 6. She returned from the vacation June 16, and the girl was not breathing. She called 911. Cleveland firefighters found her lifeless body on soiled blankets in the pen and pronounced her dead.
The Cuyahoga County medical examiner’s office determined Jailyn died of starvation and severe dehydration.
Candelario had no prior felony convictions.
She remains jailed on a $1 million bond.
Kristel Candelario News
n Ohio mother has pleaded guilty in the death of her 16-month-old daughter, whom she left home alone for ten days.
Kristel Candelario, 32, was arrested in June 2023 after police said she abandoned her daughter while vacationing in Michigan and Puerto Rico from June 6 to June 16.
Prosecutors said the child was “extremely dehydrated at the time of death.” Her body was found in a Pack-N-Play “soiled with urine and feces,” states a press release.
On Thursday, prosecutors announced Candelario pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated murder and one count of endangering children. She will be sentenced March 18.
“This case is one of those truly unimaginable cases that will stick with me for many years to come,” said Prosecutor Michael C. O’Malley. “As prosecutors, it is our job to represent the victims and today we spoke on behalf of 16-month-old Jailyn — who is no longer with us — due to the selfish decisions her mother made. This conviction today, is the first step towards justice for Jailyn.”
Kirstel Candelario Sentencing
An Ohio woman whose toddler died after she left her alone for more than a week while she went on vacation was sentenced to life in prison without parole Monday, the Cuyahoga County prosecutor said.
Kristel Candelario, 32, pleaded guilty last month to aggravated murder and endangering children in connection with the death of her 16-month-old daughter, Jailyn, last year.
Candelario left for vacation June 6 and left Jailyn alone. She visited Detroit and Puerto Rico, the prosecutor’s office said.
When she returned on June 16, she found Jailyn dead and called police, authorities said.
Jailyn died of starvation and severe dehydration due to pediatric neglect, Dr. Elizabeth Mooney, the deputy Cuyahoga County medical examiner, said in court Monday. The manner was ruled homicide.
The child was extremely dehydrated and emaciated, weighing 13 pounds, 7 pounds less than in her last doctor’s visit less than two months before, Mooney said.
Mooney, who conducted the autopsy, called Jailyn’s death “one of the most tragic and unfortunate cases I’ve had in my career thus far.” She said the child could have suffered for possibly a week.
In a statement Monday, prosecutor Michael C. O’Malley called Jailyn “a beautiful baby girl who was taken from this world due to her mother’s unimaginable selfishness.”
Candelario told the court Monday that “every day I ask forgiveness from God and from my daughter Jailyn.”
She also asked forgiveness from her other daughter and from her parents.
Candelario’s attorney, Derek Smith, said that no one was trying to excuse her behavior but that Candelario was struggling emotionally and was overwhelmed as a single mother of two children.
Candelario had tried to harm herself earlier in 2023 and she had been placed on antidepressants, which she stopped taking without tapering down in dosage as required, which can cause side effects, Smith told the court. Candelario was “not thinking clearly,” he said.
“I am not trying to justify my actions, but nobody knew how much I was suffering and what I was going through,” Candelario said through an interpreter.
Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Anna Faraglia told the court Monday that Candelario had left Jailyn alone for two days immediately before she left on vacation.
“The thought of this child dying every day while she’s having fun — humanity can’t stomach that,” Faraglia said. “And those are the actions that need to be punished. She abandoned her daughter and left her for dead.”
In sentencing Candelario, Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Brendan Sheehan noted that the police and the medical professionals involved called it one of the most horrific cases they’d ever seen.
“It stunned people across this world, because it defies one of the basic human responsibilities,” Sheehan said. He called it “the ultimate act of betrayal.