Trial to start in death of boy, 2, forgotten in van

The boy's father got to the emergency room just ahead of the ambulance carrying his stricken 2-year-old.

Gil Slutsky was at St. Mary Medical Center in Langhorne when a doctor told him that his son, Daniel, could not be revived.

"Shock him," Slutsky had yelled, reasoning that a chance remained because the child's skin was still warm.

An hour later, when permitted to say goodbye, Slutsky gathered Daniel in a hug. But while the boy's hands were cold, his back still felt hot, court records say - the result of his having been left for seven hours on a hot summer day in the locked van of a day-care provider.

In a Bucks County courtroom this week, the July 1 death of Daniel Slutsky will be revisited, with an emphasis not so much on what happened, but on why.

The Slutskys' next-door neighbor, day-care owner Rimma Shvartsman, is scheduled for trial Tuesday on charges of involuntary manslaughter, child endangerment, and leaving a child unattended in a vehicle.

Shvartsman, 47, admits she forgot Daniel in a rear seat of her van after driving with him that morning from her townhouse in Northampton Township to the Fairy Tales Day Care Center in Penndel. The toddler was found unconscious about 4:30 p.m. outside the center on the floor of the van, the temperature of his 29-pound body exceeding 108 degrees.

Prosecutors concede that Shvartsman did not intentionally leave Daniel behind, but say her actions were criminally negligent.

Shvartsman's lawyer contends that she did not consciously disregard the boy's well-being, but involuntarily forgot him due to stress, lack of sleep, and preoccupation with some troubling medical news she had just received.

Jury selection is expected to begin Tuesday morning before Senior Judge John J. Rufe.

The Slutskys have sued Shvartsman in civil court, but have never testified or spoken publicly about the case. Recently filed court documents, though, provide a previously unseen glimpse into what they have endured.

Gil Slutsky, 43, and his wife, Lyudmila, 36, had known Shvartsman for about 10 years, and trusted her. For almost a year, she periodically had driven Daniel, a dark-eyed boy with a full head of wavy brown hair, to Fairy Tales.

Shvartsman had been helping to raise a young niece whose mother - Shvartsman's sister - had died at 28 of cancer. Shvartsman had struggled with cancer as well, having undergone surgery to have her thyroid removed, court records say.

The night before Daniel Slutsky's death, Shvartsman had been distressed by a phone message left by her doctor's office and had not slept well. About 15 minutes before leaving with Daniel and her niece, she returned the doctor's call, and learned that she needed an ultrasound to check for a recurrence of the cancer.

Gil Slutsky told police that Shvartsman had not told him this, and that she seemed normal, if rushed, on July 1. He said he also spent part of the day fixing a garage door with Shvartsman's husband, who also had not mentioned it.

After dropping off her niece at a summer day camp, Shvartsman drove to Fairy Tales with Daniel belted into his car seat in back. She parked along the curb about 9:30 a.m. and went inside, forgetting the toddler as outside temperatures climbed into the 80s.

"When Mrs. Shvartsman came into the day-care that morning she was visibly shaking and looked pale and sick," Radmila Raskopin, a longtime teacher there, said in an affidavit.

Shvartsman discovered her mistake at 4:30, lifting the back hatch of her van to find Daniel, who had unbuckled his car seat in an apparent effort to escape, on the floor.

"Call 911," she yelled to a coworker as she hurried inside with Daniel in her arms, court records say.

She then called Gil Slutsky, emotionally telling him to come to Fairy Tales and that she had left Daniel in the van. Mistaking the nature of the problem, he grabbed some tools to help and set off.

As Slutsky drove, a Fairy Tales worker called and redirected him to St. Mary, saying Daniel was being sent there.

Puzzled, he called Shvartsman, who told him Daniel was unconscious and had been locked in the van all day.

At that point, "he feared that his son was dead," a police report said.

Slutsky watched the medical staff work in vain on his son. Daniel was pronounced dead at 5:17 p.m.

That evening, Shvartsman came to the Slutskys' house, where friends had gathered to console them. She asked for forgiveness, he told police, and said she could not explain her mistake.

After observing Shivah for Daniel, the Slutskys drove to Fairy Tales - which since has closed - to say a prayer and light a candle for him. They were met by a sign on the door instructing anyone with questions to call Shvartsman's cell phone.

On July 12, Shvartsman asked again to speak with Gil Slutsky, who told police they met in front of his house.

Slutsky told Shvartsman he had not been able to sleep, and needed to know whether his son had suffered. He wondered whether Daniel had simply fallen asleep in his car seat and succumbed to the heat.

She told him the truth: that Daniel apparently had tried to get out, court records say.

"She told Mr. Slutsky that she didn't know how to live with this," and had been thinking of suicide, an investigative report said.

Shvartsman told Slutsky said she had spoken to a rabbi.

The rabbi "told her that she was a tool in the hand of God," the report said, "and that 'it was just meant to happen.'"