Mother of 5 children who died in East St. Louis apartment fire indicted by grand jury
A St. Clair County grand jury on Friday indicted the mother of five children on charges that she is at least partially to blame for their deaths in a fire.
Sabrina Dunigan, 34, of North 29th Street, East St. Louis, has been charged on five counts of endangering the life/health of a child, according to St. Clair County State’s Attorney Jim Gomric’s office.
She was arrested on Nov. 7 and posted $7,500 bond.
“We are cognizant of the outpouring of sympathy for Ms. Dunigan. However, we are focused on the needless loss of innocent lives, and after due deliberation and consideration of all of the facts discovered through investigation, we have made the determination that requesting charges from the Grand Jury was warranted,” Gomric said through a statement. “My office takes seriously its responsibility to seek justice for the irresponsible and criminal acts leading to the avoidable deaths of these five young children.”
The five children were home alone on Aug. 6 when fire broke out on the second floor of the two-story, brick building near State Street, Assistant Fire Chief George McClellan said at the time.
Dunigan had briefly left to pick up her boyfriend from work, McClellan said. She reported the fire about 3:45 a.m. when she and her boyfriend were attempting to rescue her children.
Two of the children were found by firefighters in the living room under a pile of burned debris and three were found in the kitchen area.
Deontae Davis Jr., 9; 8-year-old twins Neveah Dunigan and Heaven Dunigan; Jabari Johnson, 4; and Loy’el Dunigan, 2, died on their mother’s birthday. Four of the children died on scene and one died at a local hospital.
The charging documents from Gomric’s office said the children had been left without adult supervision, which was a proximate cause of her children’s deaths.
According to a release from Gomric’s office, the criminal complaint against Dunigan was filed by the bureau chief of the Children’s Justice Division of the St. Clair County State’s Attorney’s Office.
An investigation into the fire continues by the Illinois State Fire Marshal, which has worked with the Southern Illinois Child Death Investigation Task Force, an group made up of law enforcement, medical professionals, coroners, prosecutors, and representatives from the jurisdiction’s children’s advocacy center, the release stated.
This story was originally published November 19, 2021 at 1:38 PM.
