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Sentencing delayed for mom who smothered one son, attacked another

Sentencing has been delayed for a Calgary woman who admitted that she smothered her infant son and severely injured her other boy in a series of journal entries she wrote to her dead husband.

CALGARY — Sentencing has been delayed for a Calgary woman who admitted that she smothered her infant son and severely injured her other boy in a series of journal entries she wrote to her dead husband.

Stacey Bourdeaux pleaded guilty to manslaughter as well as attempted murder and failing to provide the necessities of life last August.

Bordeaux’s 10-month-old son Sean was found not breathing in his crib in December 2004.

His death was originally thought to be from sudden infant death syndrome.

In May of 2010, Sean’s five-year-old brother was admitted to Alberta Children’s Hospital with apparent choking injuries.

After police charged Bourdeaux with attempted murder they began looking into her background and did more investigating on Sean’s death.

Court heard that in the attack on the five-year-old, Bourdeaux dragged the boy upstairs after he had thrown a tantrum. Over a two-hour period she attempted to choke him to death.

She waited several days before taking him to hospital.

Dr. Karen Barlow, a pediatric neurologist from the University of Calgary, said the boy is probably one of the most severe cases they’ve had who has managed to live.

She said the boy, now seven, is very intelligent but because of the injuries he suffered can’t speak, can’t swallow and is fed through a tube.

She said the chances of the boy dying are extremely high.

Bourdeaux detailed her feelings about the attack in a journal to her husband, Ted Fewer, who died accidentally last year. He was electrocuted while trying to retrieve something caught in a power line.

“I was trying to send him to you,” she wrote. “And if I lose him now I am going to feel really bad ... I do feel bad about doing what I did. I’m just not sure why. It was the same with Sean too. To this day I still feel the guilt of losing Sean too.”

An earlier psychiatric assessment found Bourdeaux wasn’t suffering from a disturbance of the mind, related to possible postpartum depression, at the time of the homicide.

Bordeaux has prepared a statement of her own and will read it in court before sentencing.

The case is adjourned until Feb. 24.