{"id":272371,"date":"2026-05-15T15:40:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T15:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/272371\/"},"modified":"2026-05-15T15:40:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T15:40:09","slug":"nursing-home-provider-pleads-guilty-in-child-starvation-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/272371\/","title":{"rendered":"Nursing home provider pleads guilty in child starvation case"},"content":{"rendered":"

The owner of a home healthcare company that was supposed to provide 24\/7 care to a 7-year-old boy who starved to death on Christmas in 2023 is facing a three-year prison sentence after accepting a plea agreement with prosecutors.<\/p>\n

Mirlande Moltimer, 49, owner of Samaritin Home Health Care, pleaded guilty Thursday to state charges of third-degree felony murder, aggravated manslaughter of a child, Medicaid provider fraud, and child neglect, months after pleading guilty in federal court to one count of healthcare fraud resulting in death. Her pleas were part of a global agreement with prosecutors in both cases.<\/p>\n

Deonte Atwell<\/a> weighed 7 pounds when he died at his Fort Lauderdale home. He relied on intensive home health care due to having spina bifida and hydrocephalus, a medical condition that left him immobile from the waist down. But instead of giving him that care, those around him systematically deprived him of food, prosecutors said, causing him to drop nearly 40 pounds in a year and a half. For close to two months prior to Christmas, he was having trouble breathing due to malnutrition, according to filings from prosecutors, with alarms from his ventilator going off throughout the day indicating major signs of distress.<\/p>\n

While Deonte was starving, Moltimer told the state agency Children\u2019s Medical Services during meetings that there were no issues or gaps in providing his round-the-clock care and that she had no concerns. Meanwhile, she and her employee, Cassandre Lassegue, fraudulently billed Medicaid numerous times for over $20,000 in services the child never received, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n

Lassegue, 35, a registered nurse who was supposed to provide in-home care for months before Deonte died, is charged with first-degree murder as well as felony third-degree murder, aggravated manslaughter and Medicaid fraud. Her case is still pending.<\/p>\n

Moltimer had previously sought to dismiss the charges<\/a>, arguing that Deonte\u2019s mother, Michelle Doe, was refusing to give her employees access to Deonte and that she had relied on her employees to provide the necessary care. But prosecutors said that Moltimer should have known about the neglect and repeatedly submitted claims to Medicaid without any notes from nurses indicating that a visit with Deonte had occurred.<\/p>\n

\u201cHad the victim been receiving in-home skilled nursing in the days, weeks, and months leading up to his death, he would not have starved to death or have been subjected to severe medical neglect,\u201d prosecutors said in a 2024 court filing. Instead, he \u201cendured weeks to months of unnecessary and painful suffering.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MirlandeMirlande Mortimer attemds a Nov. 18, 2024, hearing at the Broward County Courthouse in Fort Lauderdale. She is one of five people charged in the starvation death of Deonte Atwell. The owner of the home healthcare company entered a guilty plea Thursday as part of an agreement with prosecutors. (Joe Cavaretta\/South Florida Sun Sentinel)<\/p>\n

Doe, 38, and Deonte\u2019s brother, Tyreck Irvin, 22, both face charges including first-degree murder. Their cases remain pending.<\/p>\n

The boy\u2019s grandfather, James Graham, pleaded no contest in 2025 to child neglect and failure to report child abuse and was sentenced to five years of probation.<\/p>\n

Moltimer was sentenced to 20 months in state prison followed by 16 months in federal prison following her guilty pleas in both cases. She was also sentenced to seven years of state probation and must pay $25,402 in restitution along with Lassegue for the money that was fraudulently billed to Medicaid.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe death of the child was horrible,\u201d Moltimer\u2019s attorney, Bruce Lehr, told the South Florida Sun Sentinel Friday. \u201cAnd the state and the federal prosecutors fairly approached the seriousness of the result and balanced it with the blame given to my client.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is a developing story, so check back for updates.\u00a0Click here<\/a>\u00a0to have breaking news alerts sent directly to your inbox.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The owner of a home healthcare company that was supposed to provide 24\/7 care to a 7-year-old boy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272372,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[506,112,28,249,251,250,114,266,115,109],"class_list":["post-272371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-broward-county","tag-crime-and-public-safety","tag-florida","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-social"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272371\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}