Heather Miller, the former child care worker accused of felony child abuse involving three infants at The Lawrence School in Waukesha, will serve 15 years in prison and another seven on extended supervision.
During Miller’s Nov. 7 sentencing hearing, Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge David Maas said Miller, 51, deserved prison, not probationary sentences, because of the seriousness of the offenses and the betrayal it represented to parents who believed their children were in a trustworthy day care facility.
“There are defenseless infants who are placed in your care, to provide basic child care to them,” Maas said in his statements prior to sentencing. “And when those children are not only not provided with that level of care but actively abused and physically abused, that is a very serious and great offense.
“These children, whether they suffer minor injuries or debilitating injuries, should never be abused in this way.”
Following a four-day trial, a jury on Sept. 26 found Miller, a lead teacher in an infant child room at the day care facility and preschool, guilty of abusing three children at the Waukesha day care facility in 2021 and 2022.
Given the verdict, Maas formally convicted her on four of the five felony charges she faced: one count of child abuse/intentionally causing bodily harm, one count of second-degree recklessly endangering safety and two of the three counts of physical abuse of a child.
Her sentence reflected five years of initial confinement and three years of extended supervision on count 1, five years confinement and two years supervision on count 2 concurrent with count 1, and three years confinement and two years supervision on each of the other two counts, each running consecutively with count 1.
Young victim’s mothers tearfully discuss the lingering torment
During the Nov. 7 sentencing hearing, the mothers of two of the three victims spoke, often entirely through tears and words tinged with rage, about the impact the abuse had on their families — as well as the guilt they felt at the thought of having handed their children over to a facility that proved harmful.
“I received a call that no parents should ever get in their lifetime,” the mother of one victim said, recalling when she first learned of the abuse allegations that included her young son. “I’m thankful every day that someone chose to stand up for our babies and say enough is enough.”
The victims’ identities are sealed by the court, and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is not identifying them.
Noting that the long-term impact still isn’t known of the concussion her son suffered at Miller’s hands, the woman, sobbing deeply, added she was overcome by the vision about how her son “struggled to breathe” while his head was forced into the crib. “This broke me.”
She now personally suffers from post traumatic stress syndrome, with anxiety so pronounced that, on car trips with her son in the backseat, she found herself stopping her vehicle several minutes at a time to make sure her son was still breathing.
Another mother also spoke about her son’s, her family’s and her personal trauma stemming from Miller’s abuse. She wondered what she would say in court when the sentencing hearing finally took place. Her son’s vulnerability precipitated some of those words.
“How dare you!” she said, addressing Miller, struggling to get the words out through tears. “How dare you lay a hand on my child, my baby. Who was only 13 months old. He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t tell me what you did to him. You didn’t just hurt my son, You shattered my trust. You traumatized me as a mother.
“And it wasn’t just my child,” she added, noting the other two victims and that Miller had been fired by two other facilities before she was subsequently employed by The Lawrence School.
Both mothers, thanking the role Lawrence School teacher Camarie Morris played in standing up for their children as a witness, asked Maas to consider imposing the maximum sentence allowed by law, which was up to 26 years in prison.
Miller, her father and her daughter speak of her caring character
Miller’s statement to the court consisted largely of her criticism of evidence on her behalf that she felt her attorney, Pablo Galaviz, should have presented during the trial. She flatly denied all the abuse allegations.
“There are just so many different things that I wish attorney Galaviz” had raised during the trial, Miller said, adding: “I trusted him with my life.”
Miller listed elements that she said would have discredited Morris, who testified for the state, or otherwise proved her innocence. She also presented herself as a caring person.
“I am so sorry that the parents feel like I betrayed their trust and that I have hurt their kids,” she said, through tears. “I never, ever would have hurt any of them. I adored working with children,” adding later, “I did none of those things that I was accused of.”
The hearing also included two members of Miller’s own family — her daughter and her father — who offered a counterpart to claims that Miller was an unworthy and hostile caregiver.
Her father, Michael Riebe, who has worked in law enforcement, said Heather once volunteered to care for two young boys of a sheriff department detective who had lost her husband.
“For almost two years, to make it convenient, she took care of her two little boys, who where kind of hard to deal with,” Riebe said. “There was a lot of relief off the detective’s mind as to the safety of her children,” adding later: “She loved working with children.”
Her daughter, Molly Miller, who had written a letter to the court highly critical of Galaviz’s performance as a defense attorney, said her mother never had any trouble before the Lawrence School accusations arose.
“Even (for) families that testified against my mom, I babysat their children, and I never once heard anything bad said about my mom up until Camarie Morris came forward with these accusations,” Molly Miller said.
Child abuse cases led to charges and preschool closing
The case originated with an investigation that resulted in the sudden closing of The Lawrence School, 3011 Saylesville Road in Waukesha, on Sept. 14, 2022. The school never reopened.
Miller and two preschool staff administrators, Kathryn Ascher and Annemarie Fraker, were charged following a five-month investigation that began in August 2022. The investigation grew from the allegations by one parent, whose infant son showed outward and lingering signs of distress that another teacher tied to his treatment by Miller. Two more abuse allegations — one in November 2021 and another in May 2022 — involving two other children surfaced later in the investigation.
Ascher and Fraker, both charged with not reporting suspected child abuse to authorities and others, were sentenced Oct. 2, with Ascher forced to serve a one-year sentence in the Waukesha County Jail.
Hearing hints at possible appeal by Miller
One twist prior to the sentencing hearing was a motion by Galaviz to withdraw as Miller’s attorney for the case. The motion, filed Nov. 3, cited an “ethical” issue, with Galaviz stating that both Miller and her daughter had accused him of being “ineffective.”
Ahead of the hearing, Galaviz said he suspected the hearing would proceed, however, and told Maas he was capable of carrying on in Miller’s defense during sentencing. “I have never had this happen before,” he said in court, noting he has been practicing for nine years.
Addressing Miller, who discussed trial defense strategies that she felt left the jury with an incomplete picture, Maas said the sentencing hearing was not the time or place to consider the merits of her arguments.
“Those are appellate issues. … They don’t have any bearing on sentencing and the sentencing hearing,” Maas said.
“It’s ultimately the court’s decision” to decide whether Galaviz could withdraw at this stage, Maas said, noting the process could be delayed by months if a new attorney had to take over. “Then we would be right back where we started from.”
Miller, in tears, hesitated a few minutes before deciding to proceed with Galaviz. Maas denied Galaviz’s withdrawal motion.
Galaviz declined to comment on the decision after the hearing. Waukesha County Assistant District Attorney Nicole Kane also declined to comment post-sentencing.
Contact reporter Jim Riccioli at james.riccioli@jrn.com.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Heather Miller sentenced to 15 years in prison for Lawrence School child abuse cases
Reporting by Jim Riccioli, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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