BALTIMORE, Aug. 12, 2008
(AP) A toddler whose remains were found inside a suitcase in Philadelphia this spring was starved to death by members of a religious cult, including his mother, in part because he refused to say "amen" after meals, police said.Police: Boy Starved For Not Saying "Amen"
Mother, Three Other Alleged Cult Members Charged With Murder Of Toddler Found In Suitcase
Ria Ramkissoon, the mother of Javon Thompson, was charged Sunday with first-degree murder in the boy's death, and Baltimore police said Monday that three other members of a group called 1 Mind Ministries have also been charged with first-degree murder. Police and Ramkissoon's family say the group is a cult.
Members did not seek medical care for Javon when he stopped breathing, and the boy died in his mother's arms, according to court documents that described police interviews with a confidential informant and two children. He would have been about 15 months old when police say adults stopped feeding him in December 2006.
Ramkissoon, 21, was being held Monday in the psychiatric ward of Baltimore's Central Booking and Intake Center, and a bail review was postponed until Tuesday. Her public defender declined comment.
The three other people charged in Javon's death - Queen Antoinette, 40, also known as Toni Ellsberry or Toni Sloan; Marcus Cobbs, 21; and Trevia Williams, who turns 21 on Tuesday - were already in custody. They were arrested in May in New York City on warrants charging them with failure to appear in court in Baltimore. Those charges stemmed from a scuffle with police in a child custody dispute.
No one answered the phone Monday afternoon in the office of a public defender assigned to Antoinette, Cobbs and Williams.
A fifth alleged cult member, Steven Bynum, has been charged in a warrant with first-degree murder and remains at large, police said Monday. He was believed to be in New York.
Ramkissoon's family said she should not be held responsible for her son's death.
"She had no control over that situation at all," her stepfather, Craig Newton, said Monday.
Ramkissoon's mother, Seeta Khadan-Newton, told The (Baltimore) Sun on Sunday that it wasn't her daughter's decision not to feed the boy.
"My daughter was a victim, just like my grandson," Khadan-Newton said. "Somebody made that decision to not feed that child, and my daughter had to follow instructions."
According to court documents, Ramkissoon joined 1 Mind Ministries after Javon was born. Ramkissoon's mother last saw her daughter in April 2006; she later sued for custody of her grandson, writing in a letter to a judge that "the cult leaders" were preventing her from contacting her daughter.
The documents show police interviewed two school-age children who had been part of the group but were taken away from members by Philadelphia police. The children told investigators that members stopped feeding Javon in December 2006, in part because the boy refused to say "amen" after dinner. Members also viewed Javon as "a demon."
Another unnamed informant told police that after Javon died, Antoinette left the boy's body in a room for more than a week, claiming "God was going to raise Javon from the dead," the documents show.
Afterward, Antoinette burned the boy's clothing and a mattress and placed his body in a green suitcase, which she would periodically open and spray with disinfectant to mask the odor, police claim in the court documents.
In early 2007, the group members left Baltimore for Philadelphia. They left the green suitcase and other luggage inside a shed belonging to a man they befriended while there, police said, and then relocated to Brooklyn, New York.
Police recovered the suitcase in April after they got a tip from the confidential informant. The remains of a small child were inside. DNA tests are pending to confirm the boy's identity.
© MMVIII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The secrets of tennis legend 
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See all 224 CommentsThey tried that argument at Nuremburg.
Based on what?
I really feel for this poor child - as a parent, it sickens me that someone could let their child starve to death over a minor infraction. And yet, we see these kinds of child abuses all the time. If it''s done under the guise of religion - then hey - it''s OK because we have Freedom of Religion in this country. You can marry your child off at puberty, starve them, beat them, feed them hogwash disguised as "facts" and get indignant when criticised because, by gum, it''s in the Constitution!
Whether you like it or not, or believe it or not, you (the real you) are a spirit being, living in a body and you have a soul, your thought life, the mind.
You have thoughts, feelings, emotions, personality etc. that all go to make up the heart or core of your being. You are much more complicated than an animal. Animals are not moral creatures, they are ammoral. YOu have a conscience, that part of you that feels guilty, if you can still feel, when you do something wrong. If not, you have hardened your heart to the point of no-feeling.
There is much more to it, but you have enoough to chew on for now. Ping me if you want more. Otherwise, adios.
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Posted by noseonurface at 11:32 PM : Aug 12, 2008
+ report abuse
It won''t be possible, considering all things, including Human Emotions, cease to exist after death.
If it WERE possible to have some thought process after death, I''d say it''d be YOU who would be surprised and depressed. People choose to believe all sorts of Wacky Religious beliefs to avoid confronting the Terrifying fact of their own mortality.
There is NO Heaven. There is NO He11. There''s only this short time on Earth. That''s it. No Magical, Invisible, Friends will greet you on the other side.
It''s just a permanent dispersal of your body''s basic Chemical and Mineral make-up, back into the Biosphere. Simple Scientific Fact.
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Posted by vnveteran72 at 10:51 PM : Aug 12, 2008
Boy, are you gonna be surprized......or should I say disappointed? and downright depressed?
There you go, I knew that, didn''t know if you did
Snap out of it, Dimbulbs. There are NO Magical, Invisible, Friends in the Clouds. You Live, and then you Die. That''s all there is. Get used to it.
Posted by ToolMangler at 10:19 PM : Aug 12, 2008
We are accepted by God by accepting his son Jesus Christ who died for our sins. Jesus said" I am the way the truth and the light, no one comes to the father but thru me".
Posted by jankebenz at 10:14 PM : Aug 12, 2008
We really are in control to a point. We can try to be found acceptable by GOD or reject him outright. its our choice
My puny mind sees the the universe as a petri dish (even that is wrong, but again...) That we have ''self determination'' goes without saying. The ''creator'' has given us free will and the ability to discern right from wrong. he (for lack of a better word) has given his commands for us to follow and time after time has revamped his way of dealing with us. Making us in his image (reasoning, self-aware and innovative) he tried to guide us (the beginning) in his way of doing things, that having not gone the way he hoped, he turned us loose to live or die by our own hands. I see him gently nudging us along and every body resisting (parental guidance) and going our own way. It looks like at more than one time we got too big for our britches and needed reigning in and also at one juncture we almost were eradicated but he stopped short and allowed life to continue because a few had started to resemble the beings he was interested in having around him later on. By no means am I trying to assign a timeline to this exercise in thought because time has no meaning to a (to us) eternal being. Impressions are all I have to work with. The many attempts to form a ''GODs'' people came very short of the goals that had been set. In the latter days a drastic policy was born in the form of a human frame for one portion of this tremendous being, that form was shown as something ''man'' had not created by having been born of a virgin.
(end part 1)
Posted by honestabe8 at 08:55 PM : Aug 12, 2008
That all depends on ones interpretation of what constitutes being a christian is about. Some have been christians their whole lives and are more mature than some who have just started their journey. Some will say coffee is a no,no, others say its ok. Some believe that babtism must take place shortly after birth, while others believe that it should happen later,ect,ect. But the central theme of christianity is Jesus christ himself and what he did for us and that is the unifying factor.
Just because billions of people do something, does not mean its right. Fear and ignorance has driven people to religion since mankind evolved. Praying to the animals, the Sun, Zeus, Jesus or God; it''s all motivated by the basic rule of trying to explain the unexplainable (for that period). 1000 years ago people would think modern people are Gods for flying, 100 years ago DNA was unknown. Religion''s main grip is the threat of he11. If God is as great and caring as you say, why are we here? To prove our love or faith in him? Do you put your children through little faith test to see if they truly honor you, and if not starve them like this nut?
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