March 17, 2011 Shoua Kue (grandmother to deceased child), had spent the night at her daughter Ka Yang’s (mother of deceased child) house and was working on the yard when she decided to go back into the house to make breakfast.   

It was around 10am when Shoua  entered the house she asked her daughter Ka Yang if she had changed the baby’s diaper.  Ka said she did.

Shoua checked baby Maribelle’s diaper and saw that Ka had put too much powder on her bottom  so she took the baby to the bathroom sink and washed her.

Afterwards she placed the baby on the sofa to get her dressed. Maribelle was kicking as her grandmother put a diaper on her. There was a heater in the room. The grandmother sat a little distance away from the heater momentarily to warm the baby.

 Shoua then placed Maribelle inside a crib and warmed up some food for breakfast. After she set the table, the baby began to get fussy so she picked her up and held her while they ate. Ka finished eating first so Shoua handed her the baby and continued to eat.

Va Lor (younger brother to Ka’s husband) came in and they asked if he wanted to eat. He said he did not so Shoua cleared the table and put the dishes in the sink.

Ka took the baby and sat down to work on her desk where her computer was stationed. Next to her desk was a heater to keep her and the baby warm as it is customary for some Hmong woman to keep near a fire or warm heater within a few months after she gives birth.

Maribelle was almost two months old at the time.  To earn money while she cares for the baby and her family, Ka worked from home, processing checks for a company. Her husband Chia Neng Lo was a Truck Driver and was not home that day.

Ka and her husband had raised three healthy boys before Maribelle’s birth. Knowing that Ka has epilepsy, her siblings would come to live with her in the past and help out. This time it was Va Lo, Chia Neng’s younger brother who came to live with them and helped take the kids to and from school daily. 

It was approximately 1pm later that day that Shoua went back outside to work on the yard in the back of the house.  During this time, Ka was alone in the house with baby Maribelle. Va Lo had left the house sometime to pick up the children from school. 

It was around 2pm when Shoua finished the yard work and returned to the house. It rained that day and Shoua got mud on her shoes. She was about to take them off to go back inside the house when Ka came to the door holding Maribelle in her arms. The baby was still wrapped in the same blanket that Shoua left her in.

Ka said,   “Mom hurry take baby Pangkou (Maribelle’s Hmong name) to the hospital. Look what happened to her?”

Shoua saw that Ka looked disoriented and her hair was disheveled. There was blood on her lips from having bitten her tongue and it was swollen. She couldn’t speak clearly and Ka had wet herself on her pants.

Having taken care of Ka and seen her seize countless times before, Shoua knew that Ka had just suffered a seizure.

Shoua took the baby from Ka and opened the blanket. The baby was wearing a “onesy” and Shoua tried to undo the button at the top of the zipper to figure what had happened. When she pried the button open she saw the baby’s skin peel where the button had chafed. The baby felt warm.

That was when Va Lor came back from picking up the children from school.

Shoua called out to Va to come look at baby Maribelle and told him to call an ambulance. Va Lor called 911. 

When the emergency crew arrived they told the family to go outside while they investigate. That night, the family was taken to the police station for questioning.

Shoua recalls that during the interrogation Ka had said she went outside to look for her mother when in actuality Ka was just at the door.   There were many things that Ka said during the interrogation that were conflicting which should’ve been a sign that she was not herself.

Ka repeatedly told the emergency crew and police department she had seizures but no one believed her. They called her a liar. Hence, the media got a hold of this information and Ka’s story spread like wildfire across the Internet, subjecting her to the worst kinds of judgments.

Three months later on June 22, 2011,  Ka was arrested on murder charges. She was accused of microwaving Maribelle to death based on findings that Maribelle’s burns resembled those of microwave burns. They also claimed a pacifier was found in the microwave.

 Ka was pregnant at the time of her arrest and repeatedly told the police and jail staff she was pregnant. Again, no one believed her. It took the jail staff over a week to get a pregnancy test done and confirmed that Ka, indeed was telling the truth and started adequate care. Ka later gave birth to a baby girl that year. Karina now lives with her father and three brothers.

In the past four years Ka has been held in Sacramento County Jail without bail. 

On November 13, 2015, after three weeks of jury trial and two days of jury deliberation Ka was found guilty of first-degree murder.  She now faces 26 years to life in prison 

This is appalling as in any murder trial the fair amount of time a jury would take to deliberate is normally a week. Two days?

Ka was diagnosed with epilepsy at the age of fifteen.  She has confirmed diagnoses of three kinds of seizures. She is the second child in her family to have epilepsy.  As Ka was in jail, her sister, Nou Yang died from a seizure attack in June 2014 in Banning Californa.  Nou was 34 years old.

Ka explains that she sees white and wakes up and finds herself in a different room or place and does not recall how she got there.  She does not feel anything for up to one or two days after and does not recall anything that happens during this period. What she knows is that when the pain starts coming back to her; her tongue is too swollen and painful to speak, her head throbs as if it will explode and her body aches as if she’s been dropped from a tree. She then starts to remember from that point forward. 

The last memory that Ka had of her daughter that day was holding her at her work desk. It was about two days after Maribelle died that Ka started to pick up what her family had said happened to Maribelle. She started to cry.  That was when her head started to throb, the ache in her body became unbearable and her tongue felt too painful and swollen to speak.

The prosecutors would later accuse Ka that she showed no remorse at her daughter’s death during her interrogations that day, a period when she was not even self-aware. 

We are asking that Ka be placed in a medical facility where she will receive proper treatment for her illness for the duration of her sentencing and for the Appellant Court to review and reconsider giving Ka a fair retrial.   

This issue is not just about finding justice for Ka Yang. It’s about finding justice for all people who have a confirmed illness and are mentally ill, and how the law treats people with those conditions.

We realize that we have a long battle ahead of us.  With your vote we can all be heard. 

Let’s work on getting Ka Yang proper medical care and bring her home where she belongs. Not a lifetime in prison.

Thank you and may God Bless humanity.