12:00 AM CST on Wednesday, February 4, 2009

By STEVE THOMPSON / The Dallas Morning News
stevethompson@dallasnews.com / The Dallas Morning News
Tanya Eiserer contributed to this report.

Nine-year-old Chasity Butler spent her last moments in her mother's bed next to a bag of candy and a partially eaten cupcake. She died of complications related to diabetes.

To Dallas police, the sweets represent the final links in a chain of evidence showing the girl's mother failed to help her manage the disease. At times, they say, it was Chasity's younger sister who injected her with insulin.

After a long investigation, officers arrested 27-year-old Georgia Lee Jones on Monday, accusing her of neglecting her daughter and helping to cause her May 2 death.

The mother of five was booked into the Dallas County Jail to face a charge of injury to a child. She was released late Tuesday in lieu of $50,000 bail.

"Chasity's diabetes was not monitored properly causing her to be constantly sick and in bed rather than leading a normal life like other children her age," police documents say.

But Jones' husband and the father of her children defended her Tuesday. They were young parents, 30-year-old Marqus Butler said, struggling to do their best.

"It's not right – I feel like we went through enough," he said Tuesday afternoon. "She's in jail right now. She lost her daughter. CPS just came in and took my children away. It's like, when does it stop?"

Chasity's four younger sisters, ages 2 to 8, have been placed with Butler's mother, who with her husband was given permanent custody in December.

Normal 9-year-old

Butler said his oldest daughter was a typical 9-year-old.

"She was an artist," he said. "She loved to draw, color, read."

A few days before Chasity's death, Child Protective Services inspected the home because of concerns about whether Jones was managing her daughter's diabetes adequately and providing the children enough food.

According to CPS, the sisters appeared to be in good condition. Chasity was described as "upbeat" during the interview.

At the time, Butler said, he and Jones were temporarily separated. "It's hard to walk in the shoes of a young mother with five children, and one of them having a disability," he said.

The day the girl died, the family was celebrating one of the sisters' birthdays. Chasity had become ill.

"My wife let her go in and take a nap," Butler said. "By the time she came back in, she had passed."

The Dallas County medical examiner ruled the death natural, due to diabetic complications.

"All in all, I believe my wife is a good mother," Butler said. "And she's a good woman, also."

Butler said his daughter's July 2005 diagnosis of the Type I form of the disease came after she had suffered a diabetic coma.

"We rushed her to the hospital," he said. "We had to learn about how to deal with it and everything."

But police say Jones did not learn, and that was part of the problem. A week after the diagnosis, she was scheduled for a Diabetes 101 class. Police say she did not show up.

History with CPS

Police say that Jones didn't attend any follow-up medical treatment for five months.

By that time, CPS officials had already had their eye on the family. In 2001, the manager of a grocery store reported seeing 2-year-old Chasity and a younger sister unattended in a car in the parking lot. The following year, Jones' aunt left the two children unattended in the parking lot of a day care, CPS officials say.

In 2005, Jones was sentenced to probation for felony credit card abuse.

During the years after Chasity's diagnosis, CPS received reports that Jones wasn't adequately managing her daughter's disease. Each time, CPS investigators talked with doctors and others and did not find evidence of neglect.

But an endocrinologist at Children's Medical Center Dallas told police that families are required to fax the hospital weekly logs of blood glucose levels. The readings are taken several times a day with a device that families take home with them.

"According to the clinic," police documents say, "Georgia Jones was lax about sending in the BG readings and often went 2 and three months without sending any readings at all."

When the readings were sent in, police say, Chasity's levels were dangerously high. She had to be hospitalized at least five times during 2006 and 2007.

Police say that CPS investigations showed Chasity was often forced to take the readings and give insulin injections to herself or get help from her younger sister. The investigators said Jones did not adhere to diet rules, often feeding Chasity foods high in glucose such as noodles and sweets.

The day before Chasity died she had stomach pain, diarrhea and vomiting, police say. She did not eat that night or the next morning. Authorities say her mother checked her glucose level and found it dangerously high, yet fed her noodles, let her eat cupcakes and candy, and didn't take her to a doctor.

Controllable disease

Experts say Type I diabetes is a difficult disease to manage properly. Those who suffer from the disease can't produce insulin, a hormone needed to convert sugar and other foods into energy.

"You have to check your blood sugar many times a day," said Dr. Ildiko Lingvay, an assistant professor of endocrinology at UT Southwestern Medical Center. "Then you have to give yourself insulin, which is an injectable medication, several times a day."

Still, it is possible for those with the disease to lead normal lives. According to the American Diabetes Association, close to 200,000 Americans under the age of 20 have the disease. Many have medical emergencies, but only a very small number of those die from it.

"Nobody should die from Type I diabetes," Lingvay said. "Or at least not from acute complications, like you're suggesting that this girl might have had."

Staff writer Tanya Eiserer contributed to this report.

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