Overton had to have a blood transfusion and her new. I kept denying that Hannah could do such a thing, she told me. Yet to find her guilty, theyd had to believe that she knew he would die if she did not get him immediate medical attention. AP. We will always remember him fondly as a fellow Friend of Bandy Field. I never knew him but it is obvious from all the wonderful things that people are saying that he was an incredible person and friend to so many. The experience had affected her deeply, and she told Larry that she was willing to adopt a child with disabilities or an older child who had been unable to find a permanent home. The nondenominational church, on the south side of Corpus Christi, drew many young evangelicals with its emphasis on a verse-by-verse understanding of the Bible, and Larry and Hannah were well-regarded members. Kids loved her. Andrews preoccupation with eating intensified, and he began getting out of bed at night to forage for food in the kitchen. He was a Southern Gentleman and true Virginian who touched the hearts of many. To find Hannah guilty, jurors had to believe either of two scenarios: that Hannah Overton force-fed Andrew salt knowing it would kill him or that she neglected to get medical help fast enough knowing that it would kill him. The original prosecutor in the Overton case, Sandra Eastwood, was terminated for reasons unrelated to this case years after the trial concluded. Yet the jury had never heard from him. Andrew continued eating until he threw up. As long as I can make a nonfrivolous argument, Ill make it, but nothing in my job prevents me from praying for a more just outcome., There have been a few tear-filled nights because one of the kids misses Andrew, Larry said. Hannah, who was left with whiplash and a severely swollen jaw, spent the next several weeks immobilized by a neck brace, mostly confined to bed. Or had the tragedy claimed its second victim? He hoarded food and sometimes ate from the trash, she warned, and he threw intense temper tantrums, which could be tamed only by holding and rocking him. He has carried us through.". She is awakened every morning at 2:45 a.m., rarely sleeping well; the overhead light above her bed never shuts off, and announcements blare throughout the night over the loudspeaker. When people are under severe stress, their judgment becomes poor., Cortess perspective was revelatory. The Overtons have said they believed he instead had a rare medical conditioncalled hypernatremia that caused the fatal sodium levels. The Overtons moved forward with the adoption process, and in the spring of 2006, they received word that Andrew would be coming to live with them for a six-month trial period before the adoption was finalized. We welcome new information from any source about exonerations already on our list and about cases not in the Registry that might be exonerations. My husband, Tom, and I were deeply saddened to hear of Dabney's sudden passing. But was this churchgoing young woman a vicious child killer? He was a good guy and a good friend. Dear Overton Family and Friends of Dabney. (92 years old). I am truly shocked and saddened to hear of Dabney's passing. I feel happy. Death, Burial, Cemetery & Obituaries Search; Sponsored by Ancestry. I feel honored to have shared his presence. The salt poisoning case earned international attention because many believed she was wrongfully convicted and her story was featured in the 2017 documentary, Until Proven Innocent. ABC News has followed Overton's and her husband's story since her original 2007 trial. Gemma Mitchell, a phlebotomist, recalled overhearing Hannah tell medical staff that Andrew had stopped breathing after he was punished. No one could corroborate her story, and under cross-examination, she admitted that she had never told anyone this fact until taking the stand. Whenever he got scaredand there was a long list of things that petrified him, from swimming to large crowds to the sound of balloons poppingthe Overtons worked to help him overcome his fears, reassuring him that they loved him and that he was in safe surroundings. We shared wonderful times together as we mused over Rumi and different flavor ice creams. Anne Turner Overton Haile died peacefully at home in Portland, Oregon on December 7, 2021. Good-night kisses, bedtime stories, playing in the yard, birthdays, loose teeth, Christmas plays . I wouldnt give up that time we had with him and that he had with us.. My heartfelt sympathy goes out to his family and many friends. He was such a kind person and always had a smile on his face. All those that I know who knew Dabney will miss him greatly. When Michael put his fingers in his mouth, she would call his name softlythere was no anger in her voiceand he would smile and slowly slide his fingers out, Richard said. As you know, Dabney and I had a lot of good times and he was a dear friend and fraternity brother. Hannahs conviction was upheld in 2009 by the Thirteenth Court of Appeals. In the context of a criminal investigation, the calm that she had always exhibited in the midst of crisis was suddenly a liabilityan indication, perhaps, that she was cold-blooded enough to have killed a child. The following day, family court judge Carl Lewis awarded temporary custody to Hannahs mother and stepfather. Veteran defense attorney John Gilmore, whom the Overtons had retained using funds raised by their church, was stunned to learn of the arrests from reporters, who called asking for comment. Hannah went into labor with her first child, Isaac, at the Subialdeas house, and though she had planned to come back to work after her sons birth, she found the separation from him too wrenching. No amount of money will ever bring back the years that were taken away, and the seven years of freedom I lost. He recalled how Michael used to chew on his fingers, a chronic problem that left his skin bloody and raw. I would often see him riding with all the dogs in the back of the car. For the most accurate data, please search on the Detailed View page. Shortly after noon, Larry picked her and the boys up and took them to a McDonalds drive-through, and then the chiropractor, before returning to work. Im very thankful that this compensation is finally coming through, Overton told ABC News. I'm so saddened to here the news but I know that Dabney is walking his dogs in the park right now in another very special place. She is also qualified to receive insurance and education benefits. Before Hannah got married, when she was still Hannah Saenz, she knew she wanted a large familyat least six kids, she used to tell people. Four months later, on October 2, 2006, Andrew fell suddenly and acutely ill while he was alone with Hannah. The boys symptoms that afternoonvomiting, chills, and lethargyinitially suggested to the Overtons that he had a routine ailment, like a stomach bug. What a shock and a life cut too short. Although Cortes had been scheduled to testify for the prosecution, he was never put on the witness stand. It seemed to me, based upon the wording of the charge, that we had no choice but to find her guilty of capital murder. But, Warfield added, I do not believe that Mrs. Overton knew that her actions (or lack thereof) would kill Andrew Byrd [sic]. Could it be that you held his nose, held his neck, and made him drink this horrible concoction? the prosecutor challenged her during a withering cross-examination. After years of appeals and hearings the state'shighest criminal court overturned her conviction in 2014. Mr. Overton was a U. S. Army Veteran and a member of the First United Methodist Church in Bryant. Before they headed to bed, Larry turned up the lights for their nightly devotions. It was while watching the monitor that Hannah saw him trying to eat part of his foam mattress and paint off the wall. In October 2006 a four-year-old from Corpus Christi named Andrew Burd died mysteriously of salt poisoning. Richard and his wife had tried all sorts of tactics to deter him: redirecting his attention, putting gloves on him, even restraining his hands. Yet her life behind bars, however incongruous, has taken on its own rhythm. The supervisor suggested that Andrew might have an eating disorder called pica, which is characterized by a desire to consume things that have no nutritional value, and she recommended that he be evaluated by a specialist if his behavior continued. Thank you Dabney for blessing my life with your presence. Then, in the spring of 2010, Hannahs appellate attorney, Cynthia Orr, made a startling discovery. Hannah, we are all so sorry for the loss of your brother. I was assured that they would be seeking lesser charges. During the trial, he said, I sat at the courthouse for five days, waiting to testify. Our condolences to his family and friends. He was a great classmate and teamate at St Christopher's. Sending a prayer to all his family & friends. There was a dead child, he observed. H-E-Bs True Texas BBQ Restaurant Is Slipping, West Texans Are Learning What It Means to Live in Bear Country. The marks could be consistent with many things, including a fight, an altercation, someone trying to hold this childs neck forcefully, he said. Because we were not thinking we were in a life-or-death situation, she insisted. EMTs and hospital staff had vigorously poked and prodded the boy as they attempted to revive him, first at the clinic, then in an ambulance, then at Christus Spohn Hospital, where he was initially taken, and finally at Driscoll, where he was transferred to the intensive care unit. A committed Christian, he had gone on mission trips with his family since he was a child, including a fourteen-month stint in Papua New Guinea and several treks across Mexico. Dabney and I had spirited conversations about baseball. Losing his patience, Larry took the sheets to the familys fire pit and burned them. A Right-wing Cabal Took Over Odessas Municipal Government. Not long after his arrest, a grand jury upgraded the charges against him to capital murder, and he feared that he too might face life in prison. The sheets were filthy, and he was getting poop everywhere. Overtons conviction and sentence were upheld on appeal. Not long afterward, Larry and Hannah heard about Andrew at their church, Calvary Chapel of the Coastlands, which Andrews foster mother also attended. And anyone who loves dogs as much as Dabney did is a special soul indeed. Can College Sports Get More Absurd Than SMU Joining the Pac-12? Dabney was always smiling, no matter what was going on in his life. I am a better person for knowing him. My friend Dabo - thanks for the fun at Washington and Lee but mostly for these last few years when your selflessness and wisdom were refreshing to see and experience. "We shall not see his like again". His mothers and fathers parental rights were terminated soon after he turned three. By that point, they had already been shown numerous photos of Andrews small, bruised body postmortem. I fear she may have purposely withheld evidence that may have been favorable to Hannah Overtons defense, Jimenez wrote in her letter, which Orr would include in the writ. It is unclear, read the courts ruling, whether the state actually knew of Dr. Cortess opinion. The court also ruled that the wording of the jury charge was free from error. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals declined the opportunity to reconsider the decision. After a week-long trial, he was convicted of murder and sentenced to 23 years in prison. But had jurors fully understood the decision they had been asked to make? Andrews adoption hadnt been finalized, Haller said. After the Overton family heard the news yesterday, they said they celebrated with a family dinner at Hannah's mother's home, "with nothing hanging over our heads.". Larry with (from left) his children Ally, Isaac, Sebastian, Emma, and Isabel. Then, as always, Hannah had been composed, despite the strain she was under. Rather than let him remain in his wheelchair most of the day, as previous caretakers had done, Hannah kept him moving; she took him into his familys pool to stretch and used massage to loosen his contracted muscles. We thought that he would stop turning to food for comfort when he learned that he could trust us.. There was Andrews bedjust a bare piece of plywood, with no mattressand a security camera, as the baby monitor was later called at trial, trained on it. "I could never thank my attorneys enough for fighting endlessly to prove my innocence and bring me home," she said. Please call me at your earliest convenience.. Instead we were arrested.. That perception would throw her other children into the investigation as well. Skip to main content. Leave them blank to get signed up. He always made time and never in too much of a hurry for a chat. Those were great times. CORPUS CHRISTI - Early on Oct. 3, 2006, the morning after her neighbor Hannah Overton had rushed a dying 4-year-old boy to a nearby urgent care clinic, Kathi Haller got a visit from police. The jury was not just going to let her walk. Capital murder carries two possible punishments in Texasthe death penalty or life without paroleand the district attorneys office had already decided not to seek death. It did not matter that Haller, who had seen Andrew in the days leading up to his hospitalization and who was frequently in the Overton home, had never observed any suspicious bruises or indications of abuse. That official statement granted her access to state funds that are provided to the wrongfully convicted and also prevented her from being tried for the crime again. People who knew the Overtons were certain that Andrews bewildering death was accidental. Hannah Overton, a south Texas mother of five whose wrongful conviction for the 2006 death of her foster son was overturned last year, is expected to receive over $500,000 in compensation from the state for the years she spent in jail. If not for a Corpus Christi couple named Larry and Hannah Overton, Andrew might have lingered in state custody, shuffled from one foster home to another. A church elder, who was himself an adoptive parent, invited the Overtons to dinner one night and encouraged them to consider bringing Andrew into their home. And how had she forced him to choke down the lethal slurry through a sippy cupa drinking container that is, by design, able to release its contents only when sucked on? But former Nueces County District Attorney Mark Skurka charged Overton a second time for murder after her release. Overton, who has long maintained her innocence, spent seven years in prison for the young childs death. It is a small thing for one who has suffered so greatly.". He was a good friend and a great dancer!! The kids took me out back, where they jumped on the trampoline and played hide-and-seek in the salt grass. But Hannah, who was bewildered by Andrews condition, had no ready answers. By the time Hannah took the stand, jurors appeared to have made up their minds. Making him sleep on plywood burning sheets, becoming so enraged she forced him to have 23 teaspoons of hot pepper, and then watched him die in agony.. He was kind and gentle with me, and he made himself available no matter how busy he was. . Menu. Mr. Overton was also very active in the local chapter of Alcoholics Anonymous. Had Andrew sat among them, I realized, he would have been nine years old. Andrew had never been diagnosed with pica, Rotta reminded jurors. He would have been witness number one for the defense, Gilmore told me. And then there was the abnormally high sodium level, coupled with Hannahs account of feeding him Creole seasoning after he had misbehaved. After drinking a little, he threw another tantrum that continued unabated for twenty minutes. Finally he agreed to plead no contest to criminally negligent homicide. He inspired me to take up running, and to go from owning 1 dog to 2! Leave your condolences to the family on this memorial page or send flowers to show you care. Until then, she said, Andrew was doing nothing that my other kids hadnt done with the flu. The burden on the state to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt was, Gilmore told me, perhaps less than it should have been. I am so sorry to hear the news. . She looked after dozens of children, including my grandchildren, and in all the years she was here, I cant recall one negative thing being said about her, the commissions founder, Joe Fauss, told me. Frantic, Hannah began administering CPR in the backseat. Once a month, Larry loads the kids into his van and they make the trip together, although on those visits, no contact is allowed. When Emma took her first steps, Larry brought her to the parking lot outside the county jail so that Hannah could watch from her cell above. They had 4 children and were expecting their fifth. Dabney is a graduate of Aylett Country Day School, St. Christopher's School, and Washington and Lee University. Fueling the publics antipathy was an affidavit written by a CPS child abuse investigator named Jesse Garcia, who claimed that Hannah had admitted to forcing Andrew to drink two cupfuls of chili with water and quoted her as saying that she then beat the shit out of him. Garcia never produced any documentation or witnesses to corroborate his claim, and internal police memos show that law enforcement officials doubted the veracity of his story. We know that Hannah R. (Saem) Overton had been residing in Texas . He was a member of Mt. Looking for any information that might bolster the appeal, Orr requested access to the prosecutions case file. But there were many other things she had missed from behind bars. A short discussion followed about the passage, in which Jesus heals a blind man, and then Larry closed his Bible and said, Okay, guys, lets pray. One by one, the kids spoke their prayers, each of which ended with the same wish. Just as she had hoped, they would have six children. (A subsequent investigation by the attorney generals office found that no crimes had been committed. If he was denied a second or third helping, he would routinely throw a tantrum or get down on his hands and knees to scavenge the floor for crumbs. [I] fully disclosed the DAs offices case file to the defense, she wrote in the lengthy statement. Ive missed, you know, so many things, she said at the time. She is amazing!". We met when he was helping her move. In the classes they had been required to take by CPS to become adoptive parents, they had been warned that foster children often hoarded food and were more likely to have eating disorders. Hannah liked the tall, serious-minded student who shared the same hopes she had of creating a life centered on children and Christian outreach. An Unforgettable Texas Tale of Envy, Embezzlement, and Fruitcake, How the Texas Rangers Became One of the Most Powerful Forces in the State. Please enable scripts and reload this page. Dabney was born on July 31, 1963 and grew up in Essex County, Va. Until his arrest, Saenz had led a seemingly normal life: in addition to leading his nondenominational congregation, he worked as an office-machine mechanic while his wife, Lane, stayed home with their two children. There are really no words. Larry hurried home to help, but Andrew, who had been vomiting, only grew worse. Larry left for work the following morning, and Hannah, who was still in considerable pain from the car accident, gave Andrew and Sebastian breakfast before bringing them into bed with her to watch cartoons. Hess became exasperated. Andrews behavior worsened that September, after the family was involved in a car accident. Throughout the trial, Eastwood had suggested that the Overtons had withheld food as part of a larger pattern of abuse, and as she addressed the jury, she insisted that Andrew had scavenged for food because he was hungry. Dabney is survived by his sister, Hannah Overton; and nieces Emma and Lizzie Schmidt, all of Tappahannock; a half-sister Mallory Overton McKendry of Jacksonville, Fla.; and his father, Dabney Overton Jr. of Harrisonburg. Lane earned her college degree and became an elementary school teacher, while Hannah played with, and later babysat, the children of missionaries who used the campus as a home base between trips abroad. Authorize the publication of the original written obituary with the accompanying photo. Before we ever tried to adopt, we had been warned that this was going to be difficult, that this was not going to be the Little Orphan Annie story, Larry told me. She is also pregnant with her sixth child. The doctor had been the on-call emergency medicine physician at Driscoll the day that Andrew arrived, and he had resuscitated the boy as he was transported to the intensive care unit. Two years later, the Overtons learned that their adoption application had been approved and that Andrew would be joining their family. I was so shocked and saddened to learn today of Dabney's sudden and all too premature death. Overtons current defense attorney, Cynthia Orr, told ABC News she was thrilled to get the call from Skurka announcing his motion to dismiss had been granted by the judge. But what Ive realized is that I can trust his heart, even though I dont understand his plan. The reality that Hannah, who is 34, may spend the rest of her life in prison for capital murdera sentence usually reserved for violent criminals who pose a continuing threat to societyis one she is still struggling to understand; even harder to grasp is the possibility that she might never be reunited with her children. Daniel Vaughn is the countrys first barbecue editor, and he has eaten more barbecue than you have. Dear God, thank you for the soup, Isaac said, his head bowed, his eyes closed tightly. If you need legal advice, then retain an attorney to discuss the facts of your case. His foster mother, Hannah Overton, was charged with capital murder, vilified from all quarters, and sent to prison for life. Our paths crossed later in life and we renewed our friendship.