More than 30 minutes without help: this is how Stephora died according to the Public Prosecutor’s file

Santo Domingo.- The Public Ministry file on the death of the girl Stephora Anne-Mircie Joseph reveals a chain of negligence that, according to the prosecution, allowed the minor to remain submerged for more than thirty minutes at the bottom of the pool at Hacienda Los Caballos without receiving assistance, despite the desperate screams she made before sinking.

Professor Vilma Altagracia Vargas Morel, one of the defendants, was the one who tried to resuscitate her by taking her out of the water and, failing to do so, informed her colleague Gisela Altagracia de las Mercedes González by phone that the girl was “unconscious”. However, by that time she had already died. Students and teachers did not notice, or ignored, the minor’s calls for help.

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According to the accusation, the four defendants: Gisela Altagracia de las Mercedes González, Francisca Josefina Tavárez Vélez, Vilma Altagracia Vargas Morel and Yris del Carmen Reyes Adames, were responsible for organizing the excursion in violation of the Ministry of Education’s regulations, which prohibit trips to rivers, swimming pools and other spaces considered high risk. Days earlier, the Leonardo Da Vinci school gave the girl an authorization for the trip, which her mother signed without knowing the conditions of the pool, which did not have signage or basic safety measures. Nobody asked her if Stephora knew how to swim. The record details that at 9:44 in the morning the minor entered the water; a minute later she began to sink and call for help; at 9:46 she had already died of asphyxiation. Her body remained at the bottom of the pool until 10:17, when it surfaced and was finally seen by those present. Only then was she taken out of the water and attempts were made to resuscitate her. Minutes later 911 arrived. The investigation also points out serious failures in supervision. Vilma Vargas and Francisca Tavárez had delegated the surveillance of a group of children to another employee and assumed the supervision of the pool area, where Stephora was. However, the record indicates that both were talking and checking their phones, without monitoring the children in the water. Even when the girl’s body surfaced, they did not immediately notice. The fiscal document concludes that the lack of attention, the failure to comply with regulations, and the absence of effective monitoring caused a tragedy that could have been avoided, leaving a mother waiting for news without knowing that her daughter had already died.