MADISON, Wis. — The Wisconsin Supreme Court says a mother and father who prayed for their dying daughter instead of taking her to a doctor were properly convicted of homicide.
The state's highest court issued the ruling Wednesday.
Eleven-year-old Madeline Kara Neumann died in 2008 in her parents' Weston home from undiagnosed diabetes. Separate juries convicted her parents, Dale and Leilani Neumann, of second-degree reckless homicide.
The couple's attorneys noted that state law protects parents from being charged with child abuse if they choose prayer healing for an ailing child instead of medical assistance. They argued that it's difficult to know where that protection ends.
State attorneys said that immunity ends when a child is nearing death. They said the couple had a duty to seek medical help.