St. Helena woman pleads guilty, is sentenced in 2-year-old’s death

A St. Helena Island woman has pleaded guilty to unlawful conduct charges today in a child death investigation and was sentenced to prison.

LaQuana Chere Chisholm, 28, told investigators in March 2014 that the child with her at a Seaside Road home on March 4, 2014, died from a head injury after she was struck accidentally while Chisholm was exercising with a dumbbell.

Chisholm, initially charged with homicide by child abuse, pleaded guilty today to two counts of unlawful conduct toward a child and was sentenced to 17 years in prison, the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office said in a news release.

2-year-old Philicia Garry was the daughter of Chisholm’s boyfriend. After Garry was injured, Chisolm did not seek medical attention for her until her boyfriend's roommate came home several hours later and found the girl unresponsive and foaming at the mouth, according to assistant solicitor Mary Jordan Lempesis later that month.

Garry died March 6.

This story was originally published February 25, 2016 at 5:32 PM with the headline "St. Helena woman pleads guilty, is sentenced in 2-year-old’s death."