Second child's body found after mother's river plunge
WARDSBORO, Vt.—A woman waded into a brook carrying her 6-year-old daughter, purposely eluding the grasp of a would-be rescuer before being swept downriver, where her 2 1/2-year-old daughter's body was found Sunday.
Grace Waring's body was found in a section of Wardsboro Brook, a day after mother Nicole Waring, 40, and her other daughter, Dakota, died Saturday.
Vermont State Police Capt. David Covell said Waring deliberately plunged into the brook but he would not call it suicide.
"For whatever reason, it was a deliberate action," said Covell, who stopped short of calling the river plunge a suicide attempt.
Waring, of Wolcott, was reported missing about 7 a.m. Saturday after disappearing from her parents' Wardsboro house with the two girls about six hours earlier, according to Vermont State Police.
As troopers began preparing a search party, State Police Sgt. Robert McCarthy spotted Waring and a child standing on the edge of Wardsboro Brook, about 100 yards from the parents' home.
Normally placid, the brook has been swollen by rain and snowmelt and has a swift current. It ranges from about 10 feet across to about 30 feet across, and was about 3 feet deep Sunday, although officials said it was running higher Saturday.
McCarthy tried to talk to Waring but she ignored him and then walked into the water holding the child. She was standing near a rock in turbulent, waist-deep water when McCarthy reached for her, but she pushed away from the rock and eluded his grasp, plunging into the brook with daughter Dakota in her arms before being swept away, Covell said.
"The sergeant tried to communicate with her. She didn't respond at all. He was in close enough proximity that she should've recognized his presence," Covell said Sunday.
The 6-year-old was recovered downstream and pronounced dead. Waring's body was pulled from the brook -- about three-quarters of a mile downstream -- about 5:30 p.m. Saturday. Preliminary findings from autopsies suggested that they drowned, Covell said.
The woman had been despondent, but police wouldn't say why.
"I don't know particularly what issues were upsetting her, but she had been exhibiting some unusual behavior the day prior to, and during the time Sgt. McCarthy located her," said Covell. He wouldn't elaborate.
He said she made no special preparations before leaving her parents' home, on foot, about 1 a.m. Saturday.
About 50 searchers -- from Vermont State Police, Stowe Mountain Rescue, Colchester Technical Rescue and New England K-9 Search and Rescue -- participated in the search Sunday, focusing on a six-mile section of Wardsboro Brook and a portion of the West River.
The woman's husband, who was in Massachusetts at the time, has spoken to police, he said. He couldn't be reached Sunday; a telephone message left at his home was not immediately returned. A man who answered the telephone at Waring's parents' home said family members did not want to talk to a reporter.
