Guardians charged with injuring Fort Worth boy who died under state conservatorship
Two caretakers of Amari Boone, a 3-year-old who died in Fort Worth in April of a blow to his head while he was under state supervision, have been charged with injuring the boy, but not with murder.
Deondrick Foley, 37, was charged with seven counts of injury to a child by omission-bodily injury. Joseph Delancy, 29, was charged with one count of a more serious crime, injury to a child by omission-serious bodily injury. Fort Worth police arrested Foley and Delancy, who are partners, on Jan. 22, and the Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office charged them on Tuesday.
The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services oversaw Amari’s care. The agency held permanent managing conservatorship of the boy at the time of his death.
Foley and Delancy drove Amari to Cook Children’s Medical Center on April 10. He had a fractured skull and other critical injuries and died two days later. The Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office determined the cause of the boy’s death was blunt force trauma of the head and the manner was homicide.
Delancy reluctantly told police that a fall from a bathroom counter to a hardwood floor explained Amari’s head injury, according to an affidavit supporting the arrests written by Fort Worth police Detective Christopher Parker. Delancy said he stepped away from the room before the fall. He returned, and the child “jumped back up” and was talking, according to Delancy’s account. Nothing appeared to be seriously wrong, and Amari fell asleep, the caretaker said.
Foley and Delancy told police Amari was under a playpen when they woke later in the morning. He was unresponsive, and they headed to Cook Children’s from their apartment in the 1200 block of Dover Cliff Court, the suspects said.
Parker, in the affidavit, suggests that they did not immediately begin driving to the hospital, or stopped on the way, based on the driving time between the locations. The affidavit notes that Foley and Delancy arrived with Amari at the hospital about 48 minutes after the time they reported finding him injured, but that the drive should have taken no more than 18 minutes.
A Cook Children’s physician told the detective that a fall from a bathroom counter could not have caused the “massive skull fracture and massive brain injury and massive bleeding around the brain” that Amari suffered, according to the affidavit.
The felony charges of injury to a child by omission require prosecutors prove that the suspects failed “to report or act on the physically abusive injuries occurring to the victim, or seek immediate medical attention for said injuries.”
The affidavit describes detectives asking the suspects about the status of Amari’s toilet training and whether anger with accidents fueled physical abuse. It notes that Amari suffered previous injuries, including a pelvic fracture and bruises and cuts that occurred while Amari was in Foley and Delancy’s custody.
Foley and Delancy physically abused Amari, which led to the his death, according to a Texas DFPS report. Based on witness interviews and consultations with medical staff, DFPS determined that Amari suffered his fatal injuries while in Foley and Delancy’s care. They “neglectfully supervised” Amari and his younger brother, the report says.
“Department investigators determined that the deceased child’s sibling was present when the deceased child was abused and while the two caregivers abused drugs and alcohol,” according to the report. “The agency was unable to confirm an allegation that the caregivers (or an unknown person) physically abused Amari’s brother.”
The Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office wrote in a statement on its charging decision that it wanted justice for Amari.
“The Fort Worth Police Department and the Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office continue to work on this case together, seeking the best outcome for Amari Boone’s family.”
Foley and Delancy’s accounts of accidental injuries do not add up, Amari’s father, Rodney Boone, said in an interview Wednesday night with a Star-Telegram reporter.
“Doesn’t make sense,” he said.
Boone, who met on Wednesday with a prosecutor who explained the charges, said he hoped a grand jury would consider an indictment on murder.
“We know for a fact he was killed,” Boone said of his son.
Texas DFPS removed Amari and his younger brother from their biological parents on Oct. 3, 2018, and placed them in foster care, according to the department’s report on its investigation of the boy’s death.
The department received a report that Ariana George, the boys’ mother, abused drugs and that Amari was present during physical altercations. It determined that Amari’s brother tested positive for marijuana when the sibling was born.
George initially agreed to live in a shelter with the children and attend drug treatment. George and her sons left the shelter, and she requested that they be placed in foster care due to her inability to care for them, according to the DFPS report.
Amari and his brother were placed with a succession of caretakers.
At the time of Amari’s death, both siblings had been living with Foley and Delancy for about two months with DFPS approval. Rodney Boone and Foley worked together and Foley told police he was a mentor of sorts to Rodney Boone.
Amari’s parents told the Star-Telegram in a previous interview that they began to notice their son frequently had unexplained cuts and bruises.
Texas DFPS has a contract with Fort Worth-based nonprofit organization ACH Child and Family Services and its Our Communities Our Kids division to oversee foster care in Tarrant County and in other parts of the region.
Our Community Our Kids took over full management of foster care cases in Tarrant County in March, and Amari’s case had been transferred to its oversight. The caseworker on Amari’s case was an OCOK employee.
When police searched Foley and Delancy’s apartment, tests indicated significant bloodstains appeared to have been cleaned up in the bathroom and the children’s bedroom, according to the affidavit.
Police also found Google searches on their computer that included “how to keep your foster child,” “how to beat CPS,” and “how much does a foster parent make in Texas,” according to the affidavit. A search of Facebook messages between the suspects found conversations about Amari’s injuries and whether to report them.
Amari was buried at Cedar Hill Memorial Park.
This story was originally published January 27, 2021 at 6:55 PM.
