2-year-old dies in Peabody after alleged drug exposure in mother's car
PEABODY - A mother is facing charges after her 2-year-old daughter was allegedly exposed to illegal drugs in her car and died. Lily Iorio died at a Peabody hospital on January 18, authorities said.
Essex County District Attorney Paul Tucker's office said the exposure happened in her mother Vanessa Jeising's car, where the two lived. The 28-year-old told a friend that her daughter appeared to be unresponsive, according to prosecutors.
The friend told Jeising to get her daughter to the hospital. The friend then called Peabody police, who escorted the mother and daughter to the emergency room, but the girl could not be saved.
A police search of the car afterward uncovered the evidence of illegal drugs, prosecutors said.
The 28-year-old was arrested on Friday. A not guilty plea was entered on her behalf for felony charges of permitting substantial injuries to a child and reckless endangerment of a child.
Family and friends on the North Shore are devastated by the death of Lily, who would have turned 3 in May.
"I thought I was responding to something happening to my daughter," Vanessa's mother told WBZ. "When I got to that emergency room, and I saw my daughter and not my granddaughter and then I was told what had happened. I just fell. I was in disbelief."
She said her daughter got involved in drugs at age 18 and it changed her world. "It's been painful for me to watch ever since," she said.
Last August, Lynn Police charged Vanessa Jeising and Derek Iorio with reckless child endangerment, after the family was found sleeping in an unregistered car. DCF responded and let the child go home with the father's family.
"How many charges are you going to put against a mother before you decide to take that child away?" Vanessa's mother said.
Lynn Police said other relatives have long criminal histories. This grandmother is heartbroken over what they've lost forever.
"DCF needed to take that child away and send my daughter to treatment," she said.
Not guilty pleas were entered for two felony charges: Permitting substantial injuries to a child, and reckless endangerment of a child.
Jeising is due back in court for dangerousness hearing on February 3.
