April Luckese appears in court, Jan. 8, 2011.
Alex Tavshunsky/For The Toronto Star
At just 14 months old, Duy-An Nguyen was already reading, singing and taking her first tottering steps. Relatives say she was a “scary smart” baby — one who had already discovered the joys of YouTube — and among her favourite things were a children’s DVD and an owl-shaped book called “Whoo’s there?”
But never again will Duy-An read her owl book or sing along to her favourite video. On Saturday, her uncle brought the little girl’s treasured items to a funeral home in Brampton, where they will eventually be placed inside her casket.
Johnson Nguyen also brought a photograph of his niece and goddaughter, one Duy-An personally picked to be displayed at her first birthday party back in October. In the portrait, the little girl is kneeling and wearing a rosary, holding one hand over her heart. Her eyes are looking skyward.
“She chose that one,” said Nguyen, a smile tugging at his lips. “And now we’re looking back . . . (and thinking) she chose to be a saint.”
On Friday, Duy-An died at Sick Kids hospital after being taken off life support. She had suffered “severe head trauma,” according to Nguyen.
The baby’s death came two days after she was found unconscious and unresponsive at a Mississauga home. The Asta Dr. duplex belongs to 35-year-old April Luckese, who also operates an unlicensed daycare out of the location called April’s Daycare.
The Nguyen family had planned that Wednesday — the very day Duy-An was injured — would be her last under Luckese's care, the uncle said, adding the family had made other arrangements.
Luckese was initially charged with aggravated assault endangering a life and released on $15,000 bail. On Friday, she was arrested again and charged with second-degree murder.
Wearing a light-blue winter coat, Luckese appeared briefly in a Brampton court Saturday morning. The heavy-set woman with closely-cropped light brown hair said her name softly for the court and had her case remanded to Tuesday.
A publication ban has been placed on the court proceedings.
As Luckese exited the courtroom, she looked at her husband Robert, who sat in the back row with his hand frequently held to his mouth, occasionally biting on his knuckles.
Outside the courthouse, Luckese’s lawyer Bruce Daley explained he was concerned for Luckese’s safety and had requested for his client to be placed in segregation while under custody.
“When a person is in custody, quite often on a charge like this, other inmates are not particularly kind,” he said. “So I wanted to be as protective as the system would allow.”
“At the moment, she's presumed to be innocent and she ought not be put in any physical jeopardy whatsoever.”
Outside the Luckeses’ home Saturday afternoon, someone had taped a teddy bear to a tree in the front yard, along with a red sign that said, “Every Canadian mother is heartbroken. Du-Yan (sic) Nguyen R.I.P.”
The Nguyen’s maroon SUV was also still parked in the front yard, a pink baby seat in the back and a stroller in the trunk. It had being sitting there, accumulating snow, since Wednesday afternoon when Duy-An’s mother, An, came to pick her daughter up for the last time.
Wednesday was also just the second time Duy-An had been in daycare, Johnson Nguyen said. Her parents planned on pulling her out the next day, he added.
He said his sister and her husband, Loc Nguyen, had always been reluctant to entrust their beloved only child to another person’s care. The couple resorted to April’s Daycare only after the mother’s maternity leave expired and An returned to work selling hearing aids, Nguyen said.
But after using Luckese’s services for just two days, An Nguyen received permission to start bringing the baby to work, her brother explained.
“She was so excited, because she knows that she can take her along (to work now),” he said. “But she never got that chance.”
Duy-An was already unconscious at about 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, when Trevor Doyle arrived at Luckese’s home to pick up his 2-year-old son from April’s Daycare.
A couple of other mothers were already there, Doyle said, and everyone seemed upset.
“I say, what’s going on?” Doyle recalled. “And they say ‘We’ve got a problem. We’ve got a non-responsive child.”
Soon after, a “weeping” Luckese came down the stairs cradling an Asian baby in her arms, Doyle said. She told him the baby wouldn’t wake up.
“She turned the baby to me so I could see the baby’s face,” Doyle said, adding that he didn’t see any visible signs of injury. “I hold the arm and could feel a very slight pulse.”
Doyle said he asked if anyone had called 911 yet; nobody had. One woman said the baby’s mother was contacted and hadn’t seemed overly-concerned.
This was when Doyle began to feel “hotheaded,” he said.
“I raised my voice and said call 911 now.”
Within minutes, the paramedics had arrived. Shortly after entering the home, one paramedic came “sprinting” out with the baby in his arms, according to Doyle. He could see that the baby was bare-chested and had what looked to be electrocardiogram stickers on her chest.
“He was going to go through that door if it wasn’t wide open, he would have broken it down,” he said. “He was moving, this guy.”
The baby’s mother arrived shortly after, he said, walking directly to the police. She spoke with them intently and then got inside the ambulance, which drove away minutes later, Doyle said.
At that point, Doyle said he went back to the door and Luckese came to the door.
“She repeated that she was sorry. She said, ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ ” Doyle said, adding he did not know what Luckese was apologizing for.
In Ontario, the government gives licenses to daycare agencies, not individuals, and unlicensed daycares are perfectly legal so long as the caregiver is minding five or fewer children — not including their own — under the age of 10.
April’s Daycare has been operating as an unlicensed child-care provider since 2007, when it was dropped by a licensed agency called Kiddie Kare Inc., which trains and monitors child-care workers.
Kiddie Kare executive director Janice Luckese, a distant cousin, said she dropped April’s Daycare because it exceeded the number of infants allowed, even after a warning.
A few other parents familiar with April's Daycare also reported seeing Luckese caring for too many children. One neighbour, who asked not to be named, said she interviewed Luckese four months ago when seeking child care for her 1-year-old son.
While impressed with Luckese’s qualifications, including an early childhood education certification and 15 years of experience, she opted to take her son elsewhere.
“She just had way too many kids,” said the neighbour, who remembers Luckese was already caring for five children under the age of 3 at the time.
Another woman, whose son attends the same elementary school as Luckese’s, said she’s seen the caregiver with up to seven kids at a time, on top of looking after her own two boys.
“She seemed very stressed, very high-strung,” said the woman, who also declined to be named.
But Trevor Doyle, who had been using April’s Daycare for about five weeks, said he never saw Luckese with more than a few children at a time.
Doyle said he has been more than happy with Luckese’s services, for which he paid $150 a week.
“I thought she was a wonderful lady, a wonderful caregiver,” he said.
Bernadine Hoime, who took her son to April’s Daycare five years ago, said she also never noticed anything out of the ordinary, other than that Luckese occasionally seemed stressed and “flustered.”
On Saturday, Hoime drove all the way to Luckese’s Mississauga home from Malton, where she now lives. She can’t quite explain why she felt compelled to see the place where she once left her son for hours at a time.
“I don’t know, something told me to just come by,” Hoime said. “I’m freaked out. I’m very leery now (of daycare), for sure.”
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/918709--family-had-planned-to-pull-baby-out-of-home-daycare
