Man Charged After 3-Year-Old Dies From Eating Poisoned Breakfast Cereal

[Satanica]

A 45-year-old man is facing multiple charges in connection with the death of a three-year-old girl who police say was poisoned.

Toronto police and the Ontario Coroner's Office began an investigation after the girl died on March 7, 2021, after eating breakfast cereal at home.

"She quickly grew weak, vomiting ... and by the time I rushed to get to her, she was barely breathing, and looking ashen," Maurine Mirembe said of her three-year-old daughter Bernice, in a GoFundMe post.

Police allege that a man obtained a "controlled substance" from his work, and that substance was placed into children's breakfast cereal.

During a sleepover, two children in the home ate the cereal, and subsequently required hospitalization.

One of the children died in hospital, while other child recovered after a long hospital stay, police said.

Police say they are still investigating whether the incident was intentional or accidental. Investigators say they identified the controlled substance through an autopsy, but have not said what substance was used.
[....]
Following a months-long investigation, police arrested a 45-year-old Toronto man on June 19.

Francis Ngugi is charged with two counts of administering a noxious substance to endanger life, two counts of unlawfully causing bodily harm, and criminal negligence causing death.

Police say the investigation is ongoing.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/man-charged-girl-death-cereal-1.6073920

 

[Sugar Cookie]

What a pretty little baby.

 

[cubby]

Accidentally putting a poisoned substance in cereal is akin to a pedo saying he fell and his penis accidentally penetrated the 3yo. Yeah not possible. The substance was deliberately put into the cereal to hide it and then an someone fed the cereal to the children not knowing the substance was in it. That is not an accident on the hider's part, at the least it's felony neglect and at the worst murder.

 

[Sejanus]

Intentional or accidental matters not to me about this.
He is a murdering POS and should be treated as such.

 

[Totemic]

There is no accident here. The fucking idiot intentionally placed the substance in the cereal. The only possible "accident" is that the kids were not the intended victim.

 

[runninfawn]

There is no accident here. The fucking idiot intentionally placed the substance in the cereal. The only possible "accident" is that the kids were not the intended victim.

or again maybe one of the 2 children was the intended victim I say this because unsually cereal the kids love is not what an adult would eat by choice or on regula basis. It doesn't say much but i wonder if one of the children was his own or maybe his girlfriend's or wife's

 

[Busy Bee]

A childrens cereal is not a place to secure the drugs! Either he meant to poison them or he was totally wreckless and irresponsible and is not of sufficient intelligence to live in society!

 

[Mountaineer95]

So...are we now calling Frosted Flakes “Fentanyl Flakes”?

 

[runninfawn]

@mountaineer and i can see his defense : "it wasn't me your honour. I had put that stuff out of the reach of the kids but that dam tiger wanted it for himself. He jumped right out of that box, grabbed that stuff and hid it with the cereal and that's the truth".

 

[Sugar Cookie]

 

[cubby]

She was such a beautiful little girl, it's so sad that she'll never grow up because of morons being morons.

 

[Sugar Cookie]

It's Canada, I wonder if this baby girl will get justice?

 

[Sugar Cookie]

The Toronto mother of a toddler who died after her cereal was intentionally poisoned with a deadly chemical said in a victim impact statement at the sentencing hearing of the child’s killer that she’s still wracked with pain and questions about what happened.

The statement by Maurine Mirembe came as both Crown and defence lawyers presented a joint submission to sentence Francis Ngugi to life with 17 years before he can apply for parole, after he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the death of three-year-old Bernice Natanda Wamala and to attempted murder of Bernice’s friend.

Mirembe described the horror of coming to pick up her daughter from a sleepover at a friend’s house on March 7, 2021 to find Bernice pointing to her stomach and her tongue grey. Bernice’s friend was also ill. The children were taken to hospital but Bernice died.

“I will never forget this day,” she said. “Prior to this day we were so happy, singing and dancing to many songs while recording it on my phone.

“This is causing me a lot of pain in my life. I am affected emotionally and financially. I would have finished my school years back. I cannot concentrate in class and work. I am traumatized. I have lost trust for everyone,” she said.

As Mirembe’s statement was read, Ngugi looked to the floor in silence.

According to an agreed statement of facts, the children were not the intended target. Ngugi’s repeated romantic advances to Bernice’s friend’s mother, Zahra Issa, had been rebuffed, and he was becoming more obsessed with her.

The statement of facts says he hid a recording device in her room, took pictures of her official documents, and reported Issa’s husband in Tanzania to Canadian immigration authorities.

Then the documents say he stole a lethal amount of a meat curing chemical, sodium nitrite, from the Scarborough food processing plant where he worked, and mixed it in with cereal in the pantry of Issa’s home, where the children were staying overnight.

On March 7, Issa fed the cereal to the two children. In her victim impact statement, Mirembe says she still can’t understand why Ngugi, who attended the hospital that day, didn’t tell the doctors what chemical they had ingested to help save her life.

“Was he out of his mind? How can he make someone’s life like this? Why would you do this to someone who didn’t love you back? Why didn’t he say at the hospital, I did something wrong, please save the kids?” Mirembe wrote.

“Let my daughter be a sacrifice to end evil acts. I demand unconditional justice for Bernice. Rest in peace, until we meet again, my angel, my everything,” she said.

Ngugi’s actions against the family of a woman who rejected him amount to an enormous breach of trust, said Crown attorney Kathleen Farrell.

“Mr. Ngugi, as punishment for saying no to marriage, intended to kill [Issa] and in doing so instead killed a child who was extremely close to her and almost killed her own child,” said Farrell in court.

“This was not a spur of the moment decision to treat Ms. Issa in that way. He was trying to wedge his way into that family,” she said.

Defense attorney Danielle Robitaille told the court that as awful as Ngugi’s actions were, he has no criminal record and has family support.


“Mr. Ngugi has high prospects for rehabilitation and he should be able to apply for parole while there is still life left to live. Rehabilitation should be at the heart of this analysis,” she said.

Ngugi was born in 1976 in Kenya where he ran his own logistics company for about 10 years, she said. He has supportive family and has a sister who is a Canadian citizen in Toronto, she said.


Ngugi came to Toronto as a refugee from Kenya where he faced persecution for being bisexual, she said, including being attacked on the street and beaten. He had come to Canada in the hopes he could be himself without fear of violence.

After his sentence, Ngugi is likely to be deported to Kenya, lawyers said.


“As a result of his actions Mr. Ngugi’s dream of living a life where his full identity could be expressed without fear of violence will never be realized,” Robitaille said.

Toronto mother speaks out at sentencing hearing of killer who poisoned her toddler's cereal

The mother of a Toronto toddler who died after her cereal was intentionally poisoned with a deadly chemical said in a victim impact statement at the sentencing of the child’s killer that she’s still wracked with pain and questions about what happened.

www.cp24.com

"There are no words I can say to undo what I have done," Ngugi said in a statement when pleading guilty in September.

"I took the life of an angel, Bernice, and for that, I am truly sorry."

That apology is one Mirembe says she will never be able to accept until she knows more.

"Why is he sorry? Sorry for what, and why? I will never know," she said. "He's so evil."

'He's so evil': Mother of Toronto toddler who died after eating poisoned breakfast cereal speaks out after sentencing hearing

The mother of a Toronto toddler who died after eating breakfast cereal laced with sodium nitrite said there are "so many questions" left unanswered following a hearing in a downtown courtroom that saw the man responsible sentenced to life in prison.

www.cp24.com