This Is Just Shameful In Buffalo N.Y.

It is shameful to what has happened to a Buffalo area mentally disabled adult woman in a suburb of Buffalo N.Y. She was literally tortured to death by her mom and brother. From the Buffalo News: A good night for Laura Cummings meant being allowed to sleep on the kitchen floor in her family’s North Collins home.
Usually in the weeks leading up to her death, she was forced to sleep shackled to a metal chair with a sack over her face.
Days were even more nightmarish for the 23-year-old mentally disabled woman, who was held captive and brutalized, allegedly by her own mother and half brother, according to an Erie County Grand Jury indictment returned Friday.
Cummings’ short life ended Jan. 21 with a long, tortuous death and a trail of missed chances to get her to safety.
A grand jury indicted Cummings’ mother, Eva M. Cummings, 51, and her half brother, Luke J. Wright, 31, on charges related to the homicide, but authorities continued to be confounded by the apparent lack of community concern for the defenseless woman’s welfare.
“There were a lot of people who knew what was going on and said nothing, and that is a sad commentary on the human condition,” said District Attorney Frank A. Sedita III....Finnerty, who has prosecuted a number of heinous crimes in his 17 years in the DA’s office, called it “the worst case I’ve ever seen.”
“It’s sadistic, and it’s allegedly sustained over a long period of time,” he said.
That was especially true of the unlawful imprisonment of Laura Cummings, in the weeks preceding her death.
“She’s restrained more often than she’s not,” Sheriff’s Capt. Ronald L. Kenyon said.
At other times, she was treated as an inanimate object, draped with a blanket so that visitors who stopped by the apartment wouldn’t know she was there, according to authorities. http://www.buffalonews.com/2010/02/26/970986/mother-son-indicted-in-hate-crime.html
Sadly, when you read the article, many people knew what was going on. The family had been reported to Children and Adult Protective services but nothing ever happened. People visited the house and nothing was ever said.
As a teacher of the mentally disabled, it seems like Laura Cummings was mild to moderately disabled, since she had the mental ability of a pre-teen. She obviously had some skills.
Laura was born around 1987. This way past the time when the mentally disabled were automatically placed in institutions. It is possible that the mom was a young child, she may have indoctrinated in feeling that the people with disabilities were not really complete people, but that attitude is mostly with older people.
I hope they throw the book at these creeps, if they are guilty. But I can imagine the defense- either they just did the best they could or they didn't have the education they needed to work with Laura. Either excuse is pretty bad and won't fly.
Jail wouldn't be good enough to these creeps.
h/t Drudge