An Ellis County woman whose 6-month-old daughter died in 2005 in her husband’s truck says no parent should forget their baby in the back seat, but she can understand how it happens.
It was June 23, 2005, a hot Texas day, when her husband parked his pickup truck outside a church -- and forgot their baby Mika was in the back seat.
"It was an accident,” Michele Terry said. “I just couldn't blame him for that."
By the time he remembered several hours later, it was too late.
"I just believe she never woke up,” she said. “That's what I have to tell myself."
Mikey Terry didn’t usually take the kids to day care. He dropped off an older daughter and then got distracted by a phone call and road construction, she said.
"She was a great baby,” Michele Terry remembered Thursday. “Very rarely cried. Smiled."
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Terry, a Maypearl nurse, said her heart goes out to the Dallas family who lost 7-month-old Brianna Jones on Thursday when, according to police, a family friend forgot to take her to day care and left her in a car for several hours.
"You're in such a state of shock,” she said. “How does somebody, how do you forget your child?"
She said in cases where it is simply a tragic accident, criminal charges are not appropriate.
Her husband is still too emotional to talk about it.
"I don't know what he goes through, but it's torture,” she said. "Anybody who loses a child, it's beyond indescribable as far as how you feel. You're missing a piece of you."
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