Lakewood Mother Arraigned in Suffocation Death of 2-Month-Old Son

A Lakewood woman with a history of domestic violence was charged Friday with first-degree manslaughter in the suffocation death of her 2-month-old son, according to the Pierce County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office.

Bail was set at $500,000 for Jamie Marie McAdams, 22, who was arraigned in Pierce County Superior Court, according to Rebecca Stover, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office. A trial date has been set for March 21.

According to court documents, when Lakewood Police first arrived at McAdams’ home early on Jan. 13, they found her crying and kneeling on the floor next to her son, Jeremiah McAdams, who was lying dead on the floor.

McAdams initially told police that her son was sleeping near the foot of her bed in a car seat on the floor because she did not have a crib for him. She said she noticed him face down on the carpet with the car seat on top of him when her boyfriend got up to use the bathroom around 4 a.m., documents said. She said she didn’t hear him cry or hear the seat flip over.

When detectives interviewed her again this week, she changed her account twice, documents said. McAdams told a detective Wednesday that she didn’t put the car seat on the floor but on a small footstool, and that the seat flipped over while she was sleeping.

On Thursday, McAdams told police that Jeremiah would not keep his pacifier in his mouth after his feeding around 8 p.m. and that she put the pacifier back in his mouth and used a blanket to partially cover his face to keep it in his mouth, documents said. She tucked the blanket into the sides of the car seat so the pacifier would not come out.

Later in the interview, she said she accidentally killed her baby, but didn't want to call 911 for fear she would be blamed for the death, according to the documents. McAdams said she found Jeremiah dead and took the blanket that was covering him and placed it on the floor in the corner of her room. She then took the baby and put him face down on the blanket, with the car seat on top of him.

“She went back to sleep approximately 30 minutes later,” the documents said. “She hoped her boyfriend would find Jeremiah in the morning and she would not be blamed for his death, possibly her boyfriend would be blamed. When her boyfriend got up at 0400 hours and did not notice Jeremiah, the defendant got up and then pretended to discover her baby was dead.”

The Pierce County Medical Examiner's Office said the baby suffocated.

McAdams, who moved to Lakewood from Missouri, has a history of domestic violence. Her two other children were removed from her custody while living in Tennessee because she physically assaulted them, court documents said.