State settles lawsuit over day care death for $87,500
State officials have agreed to pay $87,500 to settle a lawsuit relating to the death of a 5-month-old boy in an unlicensed Carmel home day care.
Five-month-old Conor Tilson died Jan. 24, 2013. His death was listed as “sudden unexpected infant death” with a contributing factor of “unsafe sleep environment on broken Pack and Play.” The boy had been placed in a broken crib with a large blanket in a room with no adults and no baby monitor.
Conor’s parents, John Tilson Jr. and Britney Killea, said their son died “while sleeping unattended in a hazardous and unsafe environment” that his day care providers and state officials “knew or reasonably should have known” was unsafe, according to Hamilton Superior Court. The parents sued the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration and the boy’s day care provider, Stacey Cox, and several others in November 2013.
In the lawsuit, Tilson and Killea said the state, day care providers and the day care provider’s landlord failed to keep the premises in a reasonably safe condition, failed to properly protect Conor and failed to alert the parents to the unsafe conditions.
A 2013 Indianapolis Star investigation found state inspectors with the FSSA had been alerted to issues at Cox’s day care months before Conor died, but the law limited what they could do to correct the problems.
Tilson and Killea did not know Cox had been under investigation by the FSSA, according to their lawsuit.
Bryan Corbin, spokesman for the Indiana attorney general’s office, said the agency “expresses its sorrow regarding the death of the child.” The attorney general’s office, through attorney Paul Mullin, represented the FSSA in the lawsuit.
In general, when a civil lawsuit is filed, attorneys evaluate it and determine whether a settlement “would be in the best interest of taxpayers and our agency clients and would serve the interest of justice,” Corbin said.
He also pointed out that “the defendants principally responsible already have been convicted and sentenced in the criminal justice system.”
A Hamilton Superior Court jury found Cox guilty in 2013 of involuntary manslaughter in Conor’s death, court records show. The jury also found her guilty of misdemeanor deception and operating a child care home without a license. Cox was sentenced to 21/2 years in prison.
Cox’s daughter, Kirsten Phillips, was found guilty in 2014 of reckless homicide and involuntary manslaughter in the boy's death, court records show. She was sentenced to 448 days in prison, with the remainder of her three-year term to be served in community corrections.
Tilson and Killea could not immediately be reached for comment on the settlement.
Call Star reporter Marisa Kwiatkowski at (317) 444-6135. Follow her on Twitter: @IndyMarisaK.