Phabin Phillip Lucero

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This website was inspired because of the handsome blue eye angel you see here. Phabin is my son whom is miss dearly. This is his story I choose to share with you and hope that Phabin's story as well as the other children's stories that our on my website help in the fight against child abuse and raise awareness.

 

Phabin Phillip Lucero was born on March 19th, 2008. He was born a healthy happy baby. Phabin had the most beautiful blue eyes that would just melt your heart. I will never forget his smile. He had a smile that lit up any room. The dreams my family had for him were all crushed in one afternoon while Phabin was in the care of Jacob Garcia who claimed Phabin fell.

 

December 29, 2009 I went to the store to pick up a prescription and left Phabin asleep in Jacob's care. Phabin's older sister and I were in the line at the pharmacy when I got the worst phone call of my life. Jacob called and told me that Phabin fell and hit his jaw on the hardwood floor and that Phabin was unconscious. I told him to call 911. I then immediately left the line with my daughter and rushed home. By the time I got home the ambulance had already arrived and Phabin was rushed to Denver Health he was unable to breathe on his own. Jacob stuck to his story and a police officer reassured me that if Phabin fell and hit his jaw he could have been knocked out. When I arrive to the hospital doctors determined Phabin's injuries were not the result of a fall, and Jacob was arrested for child abuse resulting in severe bodily injury.

 

This was only the beginning Phabin was on life support, that night and the next day, friends and family sat with me at the hospital praying Phabin would make it. The doctors said Phabin was brain dead and that his organs would start to shut down on their own. On December 30, 2009 Phabin died in my arms after I made the hardest decision of my life, to take my baby boy off life support. I would have done anything to give my life for his. I will hold on to the time and the memories I had with my son but this will affect me the rest of my life. Phabin never got to see his second birthday, have a first day of school, he will never graduate. I will never get to talk to him about girls, or making good choices in life.  I will never be able to experience any of the things that I was so looking forward to being Phabin’s mother.

 

In my eyes I got a life sentence, I couldn’t ask for anything less as a punishment for Jacob Garcia.  For the rest of my life I will hold myself accountable for entrusting Jacob with my son. For the rest of my life I will always wonder; was Phabin in pain? I torture myself wondering if Phabin was calling for me.  I have a life sentence for entrusting Jacob and I think every day how I could have protected my baby from this.  Jacob gave no signs or warnings, his family gave me no warnings of what a monster this man was. I trusted this man and he took my baby from me for life. I pray that when I meet my son again he will forgive me for not being there to protect him when he needed me the most.  I feel like Jacob took advantage of me because I am a single mother with children and he violated me in the worst way ever.  Jacob is the most dangerous of monsters because of the cloak he wore over his true self. Jacob murdered Phabin.

 

To this day I am missing closure concerning Phabin's death.  I don’t know exactly what happened to my son that day and never will. All I really know is that I entrusted the safety and life of my son Phabin to Jacob Garcia and now he’s gone. I tried to talk to Jacob and see what really happened in the short time that I had left Phabin with him. He continued to manipulate me and professed his innocence over and over again.  This scares me more than anything because there is no remorse from Jacob, I felt as though he was just waiting to see how he can get away with what he did. What about the next single mother with kids that he encounters.  I have been given a life sentence handed out by Jacob Garcia.  I could have only hoped that Jacob was handed the same he has given me.  The monster who took Phabin's life was sentenced to 24 years for Child Abuse resulting in Death. This does not replace what he has done to my precious angel or what my family and I go through on a daily basis.  Jacob was given a plea without being held accountable for what he did. He has been given a choice where I had not been given a choice at all. It was not my choice to have my son taken from me. And there is no amount of time that would be sufficient in my opinion that would be of equal value from what he has taken from me.

 

As a caregiver for children, Jacob Garcia was covered in red flags. After an argument, one of his girlfriends called Jefferson County Human Services to report he was smoking crack cocaine around her children. Caseworkers spoke to the couple by phone four days later, when the two said they were back together. Garcia refused to take a drug test, and the case was left open without a resolution for five months longer than state law allows. In a separate incident two years later, a young girl in the care of Garcia complained that he had fondled her. Garcia admitted it to authorities, explaining that he was drunk and believed he was dreaming. He refused to take two polygraph tests, and criminal charges were never filed. The girl was left in the home. Child-protection workers recommended she receive counseling. Thirteen months later, those decisions allowed Phabin Lucero to be left in Garcia’s care while his mother was at the store. The 21-month-old was unconscious and covered in bruises when he arrived at the hospital emergency room Dec. 29, 2009. He had been alone with Garcia that day and was discovered by his mother, limp and unresponsive. Garcia said the boy had slipped on a hardwood floor. A coroner found bruises and cuts on all of his limbs, as well as his face and neck. Garcia pleaded guilty to child abuse resulting in death. He is serving 24 years in prison.

 

Denver Post Failed to death:  http://childfatalities.denverpost.com/#id=33&name=LuceroPhabin

 

I wish I would have known about this before I ever got involved with that monster. There is no way I would have ever been with this kind of person and sure the hell would have never entrusted him to care for any of my children.

Because of Jacob’s actions, I no longer get to kiss, hold, hear or touch my son. Every day is a struggle for me not to give up and because of you Jacob my family is suffering. I will always remember that I have four children, three of them are with me and one of them in an angel.