SMITHFIELD -- A forensic pediatrician told jurors Friday about the agony 4-year-old Sean Paddock must have endured in the moments before he died.
Sean Paddock suffocated in February 2006 after he was wrapped so tightly in blankets that he couldn't breathe. Lynn Paddock, his adoptive mother, is on trial on a charge of first-degree murder in his death.
Dr. Sharon Cooper, a forensic pediatrician from Fayetteville, told jurors that Sean must have been terrified and would have panicked and hyperventilated. He likely thrashed his body, further hampering the flow of oxygen to his brain, she said.
Cooper testified that Sean eventually lost consciousness but might have lived for four minutes or more before his heart finally stopped. He could have lived, she said, if the blankets had been unwrapped and someone had performed CPR.
Ron Ford Sr. -- the biological grandfather of Sean and his siblings, Hannah and David -- sighed and leaned back against a courtroom bench as Cooper described Sean's death. Ford came to court for the first time Friday. He said he had stayed away, fearing he couldn't stomach the details about the life his grandchildren said they lived at the Paddocks' remote Smithfield farmhouse.
Ford has filed a lawsuit against the state, Wake County Human Services and Children's Home Society, the private agency that placed his grandchildren with the Paddocks. He said he's seeking answers as to why they ended up with the Paddocks.
Sean's relatives had tried to figure out how to keep the children. They had lived for several months with Ron and Leanne Ford, a paternal aunt and uncle, after they were taken away from their biological parents. Wake social workers had determined that Sean and his siblings had been neglected and one of the children had been abused by their biological parents.
The Fords struggled financially to support their own three children, plus Sean, Hannah and David. They asked Wake Human Services to put the children in foster care until they could figure out their finances. The children were introduced to the Paddocks little more than a year later.
Ford saw his oldest grandson, David, at a supermarket in Clayton two months ago. David, now 11, has been adopted by a new family. He asked his grandpa, "You know Sean died, right?"
Earlier, Cooper testified that the youngest of Paddock's adopted children were starved in the Paddock home. Hannah, David and Kayla Paddock have been gaining weight since they left the home, Cooper said.
At the time of Sean's death, Hannah was 7, Kayla was 8, and David was 9. In the past two years, Hannah has gained 28 pounds, more than four times the weight gain doctors expect to see for a child of her age. Kayla gained 19 pounds, and David picked up 14 pounds.
Prosecutors contend that Paddock engaged in torture of her six adopted children.
Typically, a jury must find that a defendant premeditated a killing to be guilty of murder in the first degree. Prosecutors are not saying that Paddock calculated Sean's death. Instead, they have suggested that they will ask the jury to find her guilty of first-degree murder through a more unusual legal theory: murder by torture.
Paddock would spend the rest of her life in prison if a jury finds her guilty of first-degree murder.
Defense attorneys grilled Cooper about how much she was being paid for her testimony in this case. She is being paid for the medical exams she performed on the Paddock's children and the time she is spending on court, she said. Experts are often reimbursed for the time they spend consulting on criminal cases.
Paddock's attorneys have strongly objected to Cooper's testimony and have complained to a judge that the doctor didn't turn over all the medical studies upon which she based her opinion. On Thursday and Friday, they asked a judge to declare a mistrial, saying that Cooper was testifying beyond the scope of the discovery provided to them before the trial.
