Candace Newmaker
Encyclopedia
Candace Elizabeth Newmaker (born Candace Tiara Elmore, November 19, 1989 – April 18, 2000) was a victim of child abuse
, killed during a 70-minute attachment therapy
session to allegedly treat reactive attachment disorder
. The treatment used that day included a rebirthing
script, during which Candace was suffocated. The story had international coverage.
, North Carolina
, to Angela and Todd Elmore, she and her younger brother and sister were removed from the home for neglect and separated by social services. When she was five, her parents' parental rights were terminated. Two years later she was adopted by Jeane Elizabeth Newmaker, a single woman and pediatric nurse practitioner
in Durham
, North Carolina.
Within months of the adoption, Jeane Newmaker began taking Candace to a psychiatrist
, complaining about her behavior and attitude at home. Though Candace was treated with medications, Jeane reported that Candace's behaviors got worse during the ensuing two years, including supposedly playing with matches and killing goldfish.
in April, 2000, for a $7,000 two-week "intensive" session of Attachment Therapy with Connell Watkins, upon a referral from a licensed psychologist in North Carolina.
Candace died during the second week of the intensive with Watkins during what has been called a "rebirthing
" session. Participating in the fatal session as therapists were Watkins and Julie Ponder, along with Candace's "therapeutic foster parents", Brita St Clair and Jack McDaniel, and Jeane Newmaker.
Following the script for that day's treatment, Candace was wrapped in a flannel sheet to simulate a womb and told to extricate herself from it, with the apparent expectation that the experience would help her "attach" to her adoptive mother. Four of the adults used their hands, feet, and large pillows to resist all her attempts to free herself, while she complained, pleaded, and even screamed for help and air. Candace stated several times during the session that she was dying, to which Ponder responded, "You want to die? OK, then die. Go ahead, die right now". Twenty minutes into the session, Candace had vomited and excreted inside of the sheet; she was nonetheless kept restrained.
Forty minutes into the session, Jeane asked Candace "Baby, do you want to be born?" Candace faintly responded "no"; this would ultimately be her last word. To this, Ponder replied, "Quitter, quitter, quitter, quitter! Quit, quit, quit, quit. She's a quitter!". Jeane Newmaker, who said later she felt rejected by Candace's inability to be reborn, was asked by Watkins to leave the room, in order that Candace would not "pick up on (Jeane's) sorrow". Soon thereafter, Watkins requested the same of McDaniel and Brita St. Clair, leaving only herself and Ponder in the room with Candace. After talking for five minutes, the two unwrapped Candace and found that she was motionless, blue on the fingertips and lips, and not breathing. Upon seeing this, Watkins declared, "Oh there she is, she's sleeping in her vomit." Whereupon the mother, who had been watching on a monitor in another room, rushed into the room, remarked on Candace's color, and began CPR while Watkins called 9-1-1
. When paramedic
s arrived ten minutes later, McDaniel told them that Candace had been left alone for five minutes during a rebirthing session and was not breathing. The paramedics surmised that Candace had been unconscious
and possibly not breathing for some time. Paramedics were able to restore the girl's pulse and she was flown by helicopter to a hospital in Denver; she was declared brain-dead the next day, the consequence of asphyxia
.
The entire 70 minutes of the fatal session, as well as ten hours of other sessions from the preceding days, had been videotaped as a matter of course with Watkins's treatment. All the videos were shown at the trial of Watkins and Ponder.
. The adoptive mother, Jeanne Newmaker, a nurse practitioner, pleaded guilty to neglect and abuse charges and was given a four-year suspended sentence, after which the charges were expunged from her record. An appeal by Watkins against conviction and sentence failed. Watkins was paroled in June, 2008, under "intense supervision" with restrictions on contact with children or counseling work, having served approximately 7 years of her 16-year sentence.
The case also generated enduring controversy about attachment therapy
. It was the motivation behind "Candace's Law", in Colorado
and North Carolina
, which outlawed dangerous re-enactments of the birth experience. The US House of Representatives and Senate have separately passed resolutions urging similar actions in other states.
Candace's death inspired fictional accounts on at least three television crime dramas. An episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
had a teenage boy dying while being "reborn" to his mother. Two others were murders mysteries on the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
episode 'Cage' and on the Law & Order
episode 'Born Again'.
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
, killed during a 70-minute attachment therapy
Attachment Therapy
Attachment therapy is the most commonly used term for a controversial category of alternative child mental health interventions intended to treat attachment disorders. The term generally includes accompanying parenting techniques...
session to allegedly treat reactive attachment disorder
Reactive attachment disorder
Reactive attachment disorder is described in clinical literature as a severe and relatively uncommon disorder that can affect children. RAD is characterized by markedly disturbed and developmentally inappropriate ways of relating socially in most contexts...
. The treatment used that day included a rebirthing
Rebirthing
Rebirthing may refer to:*Rebirthing-breathwork, a form of alternative medicine mainly consisting of a breathing technique*Attachment therapy, a controversial category of alternative child mental health interventions intended to treat attachment disorders...
script, during which Candace was suffocated. The story had international coverage.
History
Born Candace Tiara Elmore in LincolntonLincolnton, North Carolina
Lincolnton is a city in Lincoln County, North Carolina, United States, within the Charlotte metropolitan area. The population was 10,683 at the 2010 census. Lincolnton is located northwest of Charlotte, on the South Fork of the Catawba River, and near the junction of State Highway 27 and U.S. Route...
, North Carolina
North Carolina
North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...
, to Angela and Todd Elmore, she and her younger brother and sister were removed from the home for neglect and separated by social services. When she was five, her parents' parental rights were terminated. Two years later she was adopted by Jeane Elizabeth Newmaker, a single woman and pediatric nurse practitioner
Nurse practitioner
A Nurse Practitioner is an Advanced practice registered nurse who has completed graduate-level education . Additional APRN roles include the Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist s, CNMs, and CNSs...
in Durham
Durham, North Carolina
Durham is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the county seat of Durham County and also extends into Wake County. It is the fifth-largest city in the state, and the 85th-largest in the United States by population, with 228,330 residents as of the 2010 United States census...
, North Carolina.
Within months of the adoption, Jeane Newmaker began taking Candace to a psychiatrist
Psychiatrist
A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
, complaining about her behavior and attitude at home. Though Candace was treated with medications, Jeane reported that Candace's behaviors got worse during the ensuing two years, including supposedly playing with matches and killing goldfish.
Attachment Therapy
Candace and Jeane Newmaker traveled to Evergreen, ColoradoEvergreen, Colorado
Evergreen is a census-designated place and a U.S. Post Office in Jefferson County, Colorado, United States. Evergreen is roughly west of Denver. The population was 9,038 at the 2010 census...
in April, 2000, for a $7,000 two-week "intensive" session of Attachment Therapy with Connell Watkins, upon a referral from a licensed psychologist in North Carolina.
Candace died during the second week of the intensive with Watkins during what has been called a "rebirthing
Rebirthing
Rebirthing may refer to:*Rebirthing-breathwork, a form of alternative medicine mainly consisting of a breathing technique*Attachment therapy, a controversial category of alternative child mental health interventions intended to treat attachment disorders...
" session. Participating in the fatal session as therapists were Watkins and Julie Ponder, along with Candace's "therapeutic foster parents", Brita St Clair and Jack McDaniel, and Jeane Newmaker.
Following the script for that day's treatment, Candace was wrapped in a flannel sheet to simulate a womb and told to extricate herself from it, with the apparent expectation that the experience would help her "attach" to her adoptive mother. Four of the adults used their hands, feet, and large pillows to resist all her attempts to free herself, while she complained, pleaded, and even screamed for help and air. Candace stated several times during the session that she was dying, to which Ponder responded, "You want to die? OK, then die. Go ahead, die right now". Twenty minutes into the session, Candace had vomited and excreted inside of the sheet; she was nonetheless kept restrained.
Forty minutes into the session, Jeane asked Candace "Baby, do you want to be born?" Candace faintly responded "no"; this would ultimately be her last word. To this, Ponder replied, "Quitter, quitter, quitter, quitter! Quit, quit, quit, quit. She's a quitter!". Jeane Newmaker, who said later she felt rejected by Candace's inability to be reborn, was asked by Watkins to leave the room, in order that Candace would not "pick up on (Jeane's) sorrow". Soon thereafter, Watkins requested the same of McDaniel and Brita St. Clair, leaving only herself and Ponder in the room with Candace. After talking for five minutes, the two unwrapped Candace and found that she was motionless, blue on the fingertips and lips, and not breathing. Upon seeing this, Watkins declared, "Oh there she is, she's sleeping in her vomit." Whereupon the mother, who had been watching on a monitor in another room, rushed into the room, remarked on Candace's color, and began CPR while Watkins called 9-1-1
9-1-1
9-1-1 is the emergency telephone number for the North American Numbering Plan .It is one of eight N11 codes.The use of this number is for emergency circumstances only, and to use it for any other purpose can be a crime.-History:In the earliest days of telephone technology, prior to the...
. When paramedic
Paramedic
A paramedic is a healthcare professional that works in emergency medical situations. Paramedics provide advanced levels of care for medical emergencies and trauma. The majority of paramedics are based in the field in ambulances, emergency response vehicles, or in specialist mobile units such as...
s arrived ten minutes later, McDaniel told them that Candace had been left alone for five minutes during a rebirthing session and was not breathing. The paramedics surmised that Candace had been unconscious
Unconsciousness
Unconsciousness is the condition of being not conscious—in a mental state that involves complete or near-complete lack of responsiveness to people and other environmental stimuli. Being in a comatose state or coma is a type of unconsciousness. Fainting due to a drop in blood pressure and a...
and possibly not breathing for some time. Paramedics were able to restore the girl's pulse and she was flown by helicopter to a hospital in Denver; she was declared brain-dead the next day, the consequence of asphyxia
Asphyxia
Asphyxia or asphyxiation is a condition of severely deficient supply of oxygen to the body that arises from being unable to breathe normally. An example of asphyxia is choking. Asphyxia causes generalized hypoxia, which primarily affects the tissues and organs...
.
The entire 70 minutes of the fatal session, as well as ten hours of other sessions from the preceding days, had been videotaped as a matter of course with Watkins's treatment. All the videos were shown at the trial of Watkins and Ponder.
Convictions
A year later, Watkins and Ponder were tried and convicted of reckless child abuse resulting in death and received 16-year prison sentences. Brita St. Clair and Jack McDaniel, the therapeutic foster parents, pleaded guilty to criminally negligent child abuse and were given ten years' probation and 1000 hours of community service in a plea bargainPlea bargain
A plea bargain is an agreement in a criminal case whereby the prosecutor offers the defendant the opportunity to plead guilty, usually to a lesser charge or to the original criminal charge with a recommendation of a lighter than the maximum sentence.A plea bargain allows criminal defendants to...
. The adoptive mother, Jeanne Newmaker, a nurse practitioner, pleaded guilty to neglect and abuse charges and was given a four-year suspended sentence, after which the charges were expunged from her record. An appeal by Watkins against conviction and sentence failed. Watkins was paroled in June, 2008, under "intense supervision" with restrictions on contact with children or counseling work, having served approximately 7 years of her 16-year sentence.
Effects
The story of Candace's death was a national one in the United States, with contemporaneous reports about her death and the subsequent trial of her therapists appearing in newspapers and news magazines around the country, and even internationally.The case also generated enduring controversy about attachment therapy
Attachment Therapy
Attachment therapy is the most commonly used term for a controversial category of alternative child mental health interventions intended to treat attachment disorders. The term generally includes accompanying parenting techniques...
. It was the motivation behind "Candace's Law", in Colorado
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...
and North Carolina
North Carolina
North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...
, which outlawed dangerous re-enactments of the birth experience. The US House of Representatives and Senate have separately passed resolutions urging similar actions in other states.
Candace's death inspired fictional accounts on at least three television crime dramas. An episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation is an American crime drama television series, which premiered on CBS on October 6, 2000. The show was created by Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer...
had a teenage boy dying while being "reborn" to his mother. Two others were murders mysteries on the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit is an American police procedural television drama series set in New York City, where it is also primarily produced...
episode 'Cage' and on the Law & Order
Law & Order
Law & Order is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the Law & Order franchise. It aired on NBC, and in syndication on various cable networks. Law & Order premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24,...
episode 'Born Again'.
See also
- Attachment disorderAttachment disorderAttachment disorder is a broad term intended to describe disorders of mood, behavior, and social relationships arising from a failure to form normal attachments to primary care giving figures in early childhood, resulting in problematic social expectations and behaviors...
- Attachment therapyAttachment TherapyAttachment therapy is the most commonly used term for a controversial category of alternative child mental health interventions intended to treat attachment disorders. The term generally includes accompanying parenting techniques...
- Advocates for Children in TherapyAdvocates for Children in TherapyAdvocates for Children in Therapy is a U.S. advocacy group opposed to attachment therapy and related treatments. The organization opposes a number of psychotherapeutic techniques which it considers potentially or actually harmful to children who undergo treatment...
- Michael and Sharen GravelleMichael and Sharen GravelleMichael and Sharen Gravelle are known for having adopted eleven special needs children in Clarksfield Township, Ohio, United States. In 2003 they were indicted for child abuse for, among other things, keeping the children in cage-like enclosures...
- Reactive attachment disorderReactive attachment disorderReactive attachment disorder is described in clinical literature as a severe and relatively uncommon disorder that can affect children. RAD is characterized by markedly disturbed and developmentally inappropriate ways of relating socially in most contexts...