Gomez to trial next week, no jury

EPHRATA — Maribel Gomez waived her right to a jury trial, leaving Grant County Superior Court Judge John Antosz to decide her innocence or guilt.

Maribel Gomez, 32, is charged with homicide by abuse and first-degree manslaughter in the death of her 2-year-old son, Rafael Gomez, Grant County Deputy Prosecutors Carolyn Fair and Steve Scott said Monday. The mother denies ever abusing the boy, though he suffered numerous broken bones, concussions, burns and bruises while in her care.

Gomez, of Ephrata, and her attorney, Bobby Moser of Moses Lake, appeared before Antosz during a hearing Monday to request a bench trial, Scott and Fair said. The defense request was granted. The trial is set to begin Feb. 12, and is expected to last about two weeks, the deputy prosecutors said.

Moser said he expects to call ten witnesses to the stand, including a key medical expert from Minnesota. The trial date was previously postponed to ensure the defense expert testifies.

Rafael Gomez, nicknamed "Raffy," was placed in foster care multiple times after social workers noticed signs of abuse.

But each time, after stints totaling a year with foster parents Bruce and Denise Griffith in Royal City, Raffy went back to Maribel Gomez and his father, Jose Arechiga, until the boy died of blunt force trauma to his head while in Maribel Gomez's care in September 2003.

"It's been three years and five months," Denise Griffith said Monday, waiting for the trial. "It's been tough, it's been very tough. We're finally here. I have trust in God and I have trust in the prosecuting attorney that things are going to be OK," Griffith added.

Griffith said she won't be able to attend the trial until she's finished testifying. Griffith is scheduled to testify toward the end of the trial, she said.

Ephrata attorney Doug Anderson, currently representing Maribel Gomez in dependency matters for her other five children, said the kids remain in foster care. Their mother is limited to two supervised visits per week with the children, Anderson said.

"Everything is still status quo, pending the outcome of the trial," the attorney said Monday.

Anderson does not represent the mother in the homicide case.

Maribel Gomez had problems with drugs before Raffy was born, Aug. 7, 2001, in the back seat of a car. Hospital tests confirmed he, like his mother, had cocaine and methamphetamine coursing through his body. Three days after birth, he was in foster care with the Griffith family.

Social workers preferred to reunite Raffy with his birth mother. They said Maribel Gomez was loving and attentive.

According to a police report, Maribel Gomez claimed Raffy was eating a bowl of noodles when he threw himself from a high chair to the floor three times, striking his head each time.

Maribel Gomez and Arechiga drove Raffy to Columbia Basin Hospital in Ephrata. He was airlifted to Sacred Heart Medical Center in Spokane, where he was pronounced brain dead the next morning.

Ephrata police ruled his death a homicide. Arechiga was at work when Raffy reportedly fell and was not charged in connection with the boy's death.

Moser was assigned the case after Maribel Gomez was charged with the death in May 2004.

In June 2004, the state Department of Social and Health Services released a child fatality review completed by a team of 13 experts who spent six months investigating Raffy's death. The experts concluded social workers ignored evidence of abuse and acted with bias in favor of the biological parents. Social workers kept pushing for reunification with Maribel Gomez when the risks were numerous, the report concluded.

"There was enough information known about Rafael to rule out accidental or self-inflicted injuries," the report stated. "(Social workers) ignored or dismissed glaring signs Raffy was in danger in (his birth parents') care."

The report placed much of the blame on Murray Twelves, a Moses Lake-based caseworker for DSHS.

Kathy Spears, a spokeswoman for DSHS, said Twelves no longer works child custody cases.

Twelves is currently employed as an "intake worker" for the agency.

"These workers take calls regarding allegations of abuse or neglect," Spears said today.