Chandler Grafner's an Angel for all of us
By Sean A. Moynihan Sunday, August
24, 2008
Lost in the collective exhalation of relief now
that the defendants have been held accountable, however, are other
important verdicts lingering in the shadows. Why, for instance,
did a passive family sit idly by with their pork chops and other
delicacies at an Easter dinner as Chandler was forced by the apparent
controlling reprobate Phillips to eat oatmeal in another room? Why
did social workers spend only a few hours with the bruised Chandler
and his younger brother before handing the boys back over to the
callous couple who posed as caring guardians? Where was the boy's
biological father while Chandler lived? Why didn't anyone step in
to save this formerly full-of-life boy with the sky-opening smile
from a long, lonely, and painful death in a waste-encrusted linen
closet?
The questions need to be answered, and the public urgently needs
to take notice that, even in the year 2008, children are being cruelly
abused by caregivers who have no business pretending to be parents
and no comprehension of basic human compassion and kindness. Horrific
as Chandler's fate was, he is not alone. Just recently, a group
of so-called adults in a religious cult in Baltimore were charged
with first degree murder for starving a 19-month-old to death because
the toddler wouldn't say "amen" at the dinner table. In Philadelphia,
Danieal Kelly, a 14-year-old suffering from cerebral palsy, was
left to die in a fetid, airless room after a group of people charged
with caring for her -- including her own parents and four social
workers -- failed to provide her with food or water.
Clearly, the issue of child abuse is one which our civic and business
leaders must place at the forefront of the public's agenda. Measures
must be taken to ensure that the desperate, misfortunate end that
befell young Chandler does not happen again. Notably, two such local
organizations, the Tennyson Center for Children, and the Every Child
Matters Education Fund, have already formed a partnership, the Children's
Action Agenda, to promote a legislative agenda encompassing child
advocacy issues and child healthcare initiatives. The group's latest
event, the Tykes on Trikes Parade, occurred just this past weekend,
as Mayor John Hickenlooper and Lieutenant Governor Barbara O'Brien
led dozens of other rain-drenched marchers -- young and old -- around
Denver's Civic Center Park to herald a renewed commitment to the
health and future of our state's children.
As a practicing trial attorney in Denver, I had the unique opportunity
to sit in on several days of the Phillips trial and to hear the
gut-wrenching testimony that issued from the mouths of witnesses
who had crossed paths with the dying boy. In those moments during
the trial, I was struck with one overriding sensation: Chandler
Grafner was present there in the courtroom; he was palpably there,
constantly reminding the assembled adults of the awful injustice
that had been perpetrated on a small child by two people with seemingly
no feelings of remorse, and no comprehension of the abject vileness
of their misconduct. Then, I would think of what Chandler's half-brother,
Dominic, had said about him to interviewers--that he was "an angel
who went to Heaven" -- and I thought of my own little boy, whom
I could see in Chandler's face in some of the photos admitted into
evidence and who thankfully would never know the hopelessness and
fear that Chandler must have felt during his long ordeal.
Justice was done in Courtroom 16 last week, but of course, it does
not help a community grieving over the unnecessary loss of one of
its own precious children. Chandler deserved better -- from everyone
-- and in his untimely passing, he will live on in this community
and be a reminding angel to all of us.
Moynihan, of Louisville, is a deputy district attorney in Denver
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