Mother Who Once Watched Ex-Boyfriend Drown Her Three Children Now Wants Custody of 3 Children

Mother Who Once Watched Ex-Boyfriend Drown Her Three Children Now Wants Custody of 3 Children

If a mother fails in her most fundamental duty as a parent — to protect her children from harm — then should she be allowed to have custody of more children? Amanda Hamm, who watched as her boyfriend sentenced her children to a horrible death by drowning and did nothing, even as her children cried to her to save them, apparently thinks so and is fighting to be able to keep her three new children.

amanda hamm

An Illinois mother who once watched her abusive boyfriend drown her three children in a car because they disrupted his party-hard lifestyle is now fighting to regain custody of her new family.

Amanda Hamm, now 39, was jailed in 2006 after Maurice LaGrove Jr put her sons Christopher, six, and Austin, three, into a car along with daughter Kyleigh, 23 months, before pushing it into a lake.

While LaGrove is still serving life for murder, Hamm was released after serving five years for child neglect, before going on to marry Leo Ware, changing her surname and having three more children.

However, those children, now aged five, three and one, were taken away after a doctor recognized her as she was giving birth to her youngest child, and Ware is now fighting to get them back.

A judge is due to decide the children’s fate tomorrow, with critics saying that returning them to her care would be putting them in severe danger.

State Attorney Joan Pernecke said Ware has ‘a history of choosing relationships that are abusive’, adding that she has told police she is afraid of her new husband because ‘of what he’s capable of’.

… Ware’s story goes back to 2003, when she fell into a relationship with LaGrove, moving in with him the day after they began dating, according to the Chicago Tribune.

LaGrove resented her children, all from different men, because they interfered with his sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll lifestyle, and began abusing them, police were told at the time.

He once held one child’s head inside an oven, pressed a screwdriver into the eldest son’s throat so hard it left a mark, and threatened the same boy with a knife, cops said.

At the same time he was also physically and mentally abusing Ware, having multiple affairs himself, while once attacking and raping her after becoming suspicious about her being unfaithful.

On September 2 that year, Ware drove with the three children and LaGrove out to Clinton Lake, where the group enjoyed a picnic together.

When it came time to leave, the children were put into the couple’s car, and the vehicle was rolled down a concrete boat ramp and into four foot of water.

As the car sank, the children were reported to have called to Ware from the back seat, pressing their hands to the glass as the car filled with water, before slipping under.

LaGrove called the emergency services and said the pair had tried to rescue the children, but were unable to do it.

However, the first responder, a man of only 5ft 3in, was able to easily wade into the water and open the rear door of the car, where he found the children’s lifeless bodies.

… She was jailed for five years in 2006, and after her release she went on to meet new husband Leo at a halfway house.

According to state social workers, Ware has a long history of both substance abuse and depression.

The pair married, but in 2012 police were called to their home after Ware said her husband had struck her on the neck with his palm, leaving a mark.

However, the officer who responded saw no reason to call child services, and no charges were ever filed against Leo.

The following year, while Ware was pregnant with the couple’s second child, police were again called to their home, this time because Leo had stolen $100 from her.

On that occasion, officers say she confessed that Leo had been taking crack cocaine, and she was scared of him because ‘he has been abusive in the past and I know what he is capable of doing’.

According to officers, Leo has a history of involvement with gangs and drug dealing.

She’s a victim of domestic abuse herself, which is undoubtedly awful. But she still failed to protect her children, let them be killed as they begged her to save them — and she evidently hasn’t learned, either, as she’s apparently with another violent, drug-addicted thug who is abusive as well. She’s forfeited her right to be a mother at this point.

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