SI Mom Arrested After Oxycodone Gets In Girl's Sandwich

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A 28-year-old mother of two on Staten Island is charged with endangering the welfare of a minor after her Oxycodone pills wound up in a jelly sandwich that was passed to her neighbor's daughters after school on Wednesday. "It was a simple accident. It was my fault. It wasn’t carelessness on my part, it was an accident on my part," Denise Manzella tells the Advance. But she also thinks the incident is being blown a bit out of proportion, giving the paper quote that perfectly underscores why lawyers advise their clients not to talk to press.

Manzella says that even if the girls ate the sandwich, they surely would have spit it out, because the pills "would have hurt their teeth." Thankfully, it didn't come to that, because their vigilant grandmother Margaret Gutzan spotted Manzella's daughters, ages 3 and 5, passing the sandwich through a fence between their yards to her granddaughters, ages 3 and 7. One of her granddaughters is allergic to peanut butter, so Gutzan seized the sandwich to check its ingredients, discovering the pills. Manzella, a bartender, says she takes Oxycodone for a bladder condition called interstitial cystitis, to cope with past domestic violence injuries, and because of a childhood car accident.

Gutzan and her daughter called police, who charged Manzella on Thursday. (She wasn't arraigned until Saturday because she was hospitalized for what Manzella describes as "a nervous breakdown.) She claims that she left the medication on top of the microwave while taking her 5-year-old to the bathroom, and while she was gone the 3-year-old, who was helping her make the sandwiches, added the pills. She claims her daughter was trying to help Mommy take her meds, but instead the tots wound up outside with the spiked sandwiches. "My 3-year-old said, 'Mommy, I don’t want to go to jail. I made that for you,'" Manzella tells the Advance.

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By John Del Signore in News on April 27, 2010 9:42 AM

Comments [rss]

Cannibal

You try making complicated jelly sandwiches high as shit and see how well you do...

echo

Mmmmm... oxycodone sandwich!

NannyState

They taste better because they're made with love!

ozik

Why was this woman giving sandwiches to the neighbor kids? That alone strikes me as odd, not that neighbors don't do nice things for one another...

Part of me fears that this is the equivalent of tryint to poison the neighbors dog.

echo

I wondered the same thing. Seems odd.

Politburo

You first question illustrates all that is wrong with this country today.

ozik

I thought about that while I wrote it and have to disagree. I don't know the folks involved, don't know the situation, but it sounds like the woman made a sandwich with her daughter and then walked out and gave the sandwich to her neighbor kids "through the fence". There are lots of things missing from this that would make the sandwich-giving a instantly understandable:

1. Was her daughter playing with the kids? no, she was helping make a sandwich

2. Were the kids playing away from their home and in need of a friendly snack? no

3. Did the daughter have a sandwich with said neighbor kids? i believe not

4. Were the neighbors aware enough of each others business for the giver to know that one of the children had a peanut butter allergy? no.

Number four is the big one. That made it go from "friendly neighbor" to "creepy lady who lives next door that we don't talk to". Also, the grandmother saw the woman pass the sandwich. She didn't then say "Hey neighbor, is there peanut butter in there?" No she "seized the sandwich" and checked it.

The whole thing stinks big time.

ozik

Oh wait, the daughter passed the sandwich. That changes things

sexisicilian

what the french?!

ANGRYGOD11

Oxycodone pills are always sold in a secure, childproof container, just like any other highly controlled substance. How they got into a kid's sandwich would be beyond David Copperfield.

Guest

Why were the police even involved in this? Things happen. This sounds like a careless moment on her part. Find me one parent in this world who hasn't had a careless moment.

handsomedevil

Well, when you find out your child is being served a sandwich with pills inside, you'd probably assume it was intentional, not some bizarre "open bottle + unattended sandwich + 3-year old" scenario.

Politburo

So in your mind, it's more likely that your neighbor is trying to kill your granddaughter than it is some kind of mistake? Really?

You're watching too much Law and Order...

handsomedevil

Occam's razor, yo.

r1b2

Honey, I think there's a pretty significant difference between "a careless moment" and leavign an open bottle of narcotics within reach of a child and then having those narcotics get passed to a neighbor's kid. A careless moment is looking away and over-filling a cup of milk and then having to clean up the mess.

r1b2

Honey, I think there's a pretty significant difference between "a careless moment" and leavign an open bottle of narcotics within reach of a child and then having those narcotics get passed to a neighbor's kid. A careless moment is looking away and over-filling a cup of milk and then having to clean up the mess.

Politburo

Obviously this woman screwed up.

But really, where is the need for the police here? Couldn't you talk to the neighbor and say, "hey, wtf?"